All HALLOW'S EVE II - EXTREME UNCTION
By Sue Esty (Windsinger@aol.com)
Synopsis: Mulder and Scully return to the Halloween bonfire dance
they visited in 1995 and run up against a very menacing figure. Bad
things happen after that. (This is a Windsinger story, what do you
expect?)
Rated: PG-13. Slight season IV premier spoiler alert! Sad, weird,
yucky, depressing, and horrible things happen but few bad words or
violence and the relationship stuff (what there is of it) is tender
and not explicit.
Disclaimer: Thank you, thank you, thank you CC, DD, GA and Ten
Thirteen Productions for creating these characters. They brighten
my life even if they don't add one penny to my pocket. As with all
my work, this story may be reproduced as long as the contents are
not changed and the author is acknowledged.
Author's Notes: Though it would be nice if you had read All
Hallow's Eve, you don't really need to for All Hallow's Eve II.
There is some mild spoiler material from the season IV premier but
not much. Knowledge of 'The Erlenmeyer Flask' and the 'Calusari'
would help and I make extremely vague references to two of my
shorter and earlier stories 'Do Not Go Gentle' and 'Deliver Us from
Evil'. My Mulder birthday story from this year 'Angle Food' could
almost be a prelude to this but is not in any way required.
Chapter 1
Southern Maryland
October 31, 1996
Dana Scully pulled the right shoulder of her peasant blouse
down and examined her reflection critically in the motel mirror.
Hastily, she pulled the elasticized neckline back up and pulled the
left side down. Frowning, she pulled both sides off her shoulders
until her cleavage showed.
Not good, she thought practically. This was late October, she
would freeze dressed like that. Quickly, she pulled up the material
until her shoulders were covered again and added a long necklace
of large, heavy Cat's Eye chips. The semi-precious stones certainly
weighted the blouse down between her breasts rather nicely but
something was still wrong. She changed her hair three times -
French braids, pony tail and finally tucked into a large brass
clip. Nothing looked right. With irritation she brushed it out and
let it wave naturally.
Her eyes drifted down. Now the skirt was nice, tea length they
used to call it but this had yards and yards more fabric in its
three-tiered gathers than anyone would likely wear to tea. She
added a shawl printed with bright red roses around her hips and
applied matching lipstick. One look and she wiped off the majority
of that with a handful of tissues.
What was wrong! Something but what? The feeling of wrongness
seemed strongest around her shoulders and above. Discouraged, she
stood with hands on hips and glared from a different angle into the
mirror at her hair, her face. Why not admit it? The problem was not
her but the empty space behind her. She was missing Mulder's
looming, broad-shoulder six foot plus presence. He should be here
giving her a hard time about this ridiculous get-up. Why had she
ever bought it anyway? Why had she ever come? She really didn't
want to go to this party alone.
Damn it, Mulder, why aren't you here? A Capitol's game, you
said. Oh, really? An old college friend?
If it had been anyone but Mulder, she would have suspected
that he had simply forgotten, though how anyway could have
forgotten their last Halloween Dana had no idea: bonfires, pseudo-
Celtic worship, beast masks over costumes which were sparse to
none, burning of plush purple dinosaurs in effigy, and bubbling
cauldrons of gummy worms and store bought chicken entrails. The
stamping, laughing, drumming and dancing teens had been more than
willing to welcome a couple of world-weary 'adults'. Then of course
there was passing out in the tall grass zonked out of their minds
on air-borne hallucinogens.
Oh, yes, Dana thought, and let us not forget the more Mulder-
like activities such as talking with the dead and reliving
nightmares.
Standing in the dew-wet field that morning a year before he
had said in perfect seriousness, "Next year, or maybe the year
after that, I might like to come back... to let the spirits know
they aren't forgotten."
"Would you mind if I come along?" she had asked.
He had been pleased at her request but of course he had to
turn it into a joke. "You know you're always welcome... Only next
time we come prepared. We bring a blanket."
"Only one?"
And to that he had only winked slyly.
The year that followed had been at times horrible, frustrating
and just far too much hard work. Dana had almost lost Mulder again
in the explosion of that train car, had seen him in the hospital
again several times. Skinner had been shot and suspected of murder,
and important evidence had once again been ripped out of their
hands. They had been forced to stand by and watch people in
positions of power tromp without a moment's hesitation over both
their civil and human rights. Most painful for Mulder was to learn
that his mother shared some secret with the enemy, a secret so
terrible that it had brought on a stroke. Then, as unexplainably as
she fallen ill, the older woman had emerged from her coma only six
days before, disoriented but much improved.
Through it all Dana had watched her relationship with Mulder
stretched to the breaking point, always coming back together but
always with a little more scar tissue. Was it any wonder that at
odd times during the ensuing months Dana would think about that
wink and that almost promise under the chill fall sunrise? She was
afraid, so afraid, that if they didn't move off this ground zero
they were stuck on that something, or someone could too easily come
and drive a wedge between them that would be irreparable.
The only alternative Dana could see was to pursue the wink and
the sly smile. She didn't know what they might be getting into but
at least she was willing to try. By his absence, apparently Mulder
no longer was.
So what was she doing here alone? She could be home in her own
bed right now. Right, her own empty bed in her sterile apartment.
Not even Queequeg for company. Not even Mulder's voice on the
telephone because he was at a hockey game watching grown men beat
each other's brains out with sticks. Admit it, it was Mulder she
missed. They had been separated for almost two weeks. The last time
they had been together had been the night of his birthday. Upon
their returning from another trip to Providence to visit his mother
in the hospital, Dana had taken him to Disney's stage production of
Beauty and the Beast at the Kennedy Center. He had been a little
shocked when she had asked him to wear a tux but he seemed to like
the surprise. The spectacle of the Beast's transformation suspended
in mid air, however, had reminded Mulder too much of poor Max
Fenig's last moments. Leave it to Mulder to turn a harmless fairy
tale into something traumatic.
The morning after their night out Dana was given her next
assignment. A DC-10 had crashed into Lake Michigan and the military
was asking for pathologists to help in identifying the casualties.
Would she go? And so that was where she had been the last two
weeks. The work had been mind numbingly depressing as well as
exhausting and Mulder's nightly calls had been just about all that
had kept her sane. His absence had become like a sore that wouldn't
heal.
The only problem besides the loneliness was that he never
brought up the subject of Halloween. Unable to bear it any longer,
Dana had finally alluded to the holiday casually two days earlier
during one of their late night calls. "So, what are you doing for
Halloween, Mulder? Off to see Friday the Thirteenth part twenty-
seven?"
"Me? Oh, an old college classmate is going to be in town and
has asked me to a Capitol's game. Who needs to watch chainsaw
massacre movies when you've got professional hockey?"
In answer to that depressing bit of news Dana had proceeded to
inform him that she was coming into D.C. Friday morning, the
morning after Halloween. She didn't mention that in reality she was
flying into Southern Maryland Regional Airport Thursday afternoon
and renting a car.
So here she was alone in a Motel 6 a few miles from the site
of last year's unanticipated gathering and getting ready for a
party that she didn't want to go to. Hastily she picked up a heavy
shawl, a large wool army blanket and her donation for the evening
festivities - a grocery sack of potato and corn chips. If these
helped soak up even part of the alcohol the young people would be
consuming tonight, the fresh breakouts of acne would be worth it.
One final look around the clean but slightly threadbare motel
room and Dana headed for the door. She really had been a fool not
to stay someplace nicer since Mulder wasn't choosing. But old
habits were hard to break. Besides as she slept in her lonely bed
that night it would be easier to imagine Mulder on the other side
of the wall.
Having turned as she came out of her door to check that it was
locked securely, Dana became aware of a presence. Nothing she could
see as yet but a person was in the parking lot behind her. It would
be a simple matter for someone to hide in one of the many black
pools of shadow created by the motel's totally inadequate lighting.
Turning slowly, she saw out of the corner of her eye a tall, lean
form of a man dressed in dark clothes leaning against a car. The
car looked familiar, so did the man.
Not wanting to make a fool of herself, Dana forced a blink to
be certain. "Mulder!" she cried as she flew at him to thrust her
fists against his chest. Mulder staggered back against the hood of
his own seldom used vehicle. "Ouch! What are you trying to do, hug
me or rip out my heart?"
"I don't think I've decided yet. You scared me half to death.
What are you doing here?"
"Just a little surprise..."
"A little surprise! And what happened to your hockey game?"
"And what happened to your Friday morning flight?"
They glowered at each other but almost immediately both
expressions softened.
"I think we'd better start over," Dana's partner suggested
raising himself from the hood of the car.
Dana found herself grinning which was an odd feeling. She
hadn't smiled in weeks except slightly at some of Mulder's bad
jokes over the telephone. "Mulder, it's so good to see you."
He smiled back. A genuine smile of relaxed pleasure. No hidden
agendas here. "I'd say that was a better start. It's good to see
me, too, but better to see you." He crossed his arms and gave her
outfit - at least she thought it was her outfit - his complete
attention. "You look wonderful."
Dana couldn't help but admire him back. It was a pleasure to
look at him at any time but tonight he wore his favorite tight-
fitting jeans and under his old black 'biker' jacket she could see
the sleek black knitted shirt she loved. It was hard to stay mad at
him when he looked like that, but somehow she managed. "Compliments
aren't going to get you anywhere, Mister." A pause. "I thought
you'd forgotten." She had not been able to keep her voice from
breaking just a little.
"Me?" he asked virtuously. Oh, he could pull that innocent
routine so well, all except for his eyes which were more than a
little apologetic. "You know me, I don't forget anything, even if
I want to."
"You said you had an old college friend coming to town and you
were going to a hockey game."
"When have you known me to have any old college friends?" The
image of Phoebe as she had looked in that slinky black evening
dress rose unbidden between them . "Forget I said that," he
grimaced then hurried on. "After what you've been through these
past two weeks how could I ask you to do the Dance of Death with
me? If you had mentioned it I would have agreed immediately. I just
made up that story because I didn't want to put any pressure on
you."
Dana stood facing him hands on her hips though she knew that
in this outfit that stance lacked much of its impact. To add a
little emphasis she stepped forward and planted her right index
finger squarely in the center of his chest. "And since when do I
need your protection? Don't you think I should have been given the
opportunity to make that decision for myself?"
He picked up her hand and stared at her finger then turned it
around so that she could see it too. "I'm bleeding!" he protested.
Dana stared wide-eyed. Her finger was covered with a thick
dark substance that glistened slightly red in the motel parking lot
lights.
The blood... blood... so much blood. The bodies, the poor
bodies of the crash victims full of mildew and decay from having
been days in the cold lake. From somewhere Mulder pulled out a
handkerchief and was wiping her finger clean. "Scully, Scully, I'm
sorry. That's just the remains of my dinner. I had this pork
barbecue..." Next thing she knew he had stuffed a handful of snack-
sized Butterfingers candy bars into her hands. "Here you look like
you're badly in need of some of these."
The memory of the devastation that had wrecked so many young
and beautiful lives faded into the background as Dana stared first
at the stricken look on Mulder's face and then his offering in her
hands. Her favorite kind of sugar vice. "Mulder, where did
these...?"
For the first time she saw the sack which was sitting by his
feet. Bags and bags and bags of candy bars. Clearly his provisions
for the party.
"Come on," he said reaching down for his sack and taking her
bag of chips from her. "I want to hear the Celtic drums beating in
my soul."
They went in Mulder's car leaving her rental at the motel.
Dana laid her head back against the seat and stared up at the sky.
A nearly full moon had risen and like the previous Halloween night
the witch clouds played tag with each other across its bright lunar
face.
"How did you know where to find me?" she asked.
"That's a long story."
"We've got time, besides I'm always interested in seeing how
your mind works."
"Coming from a person who likes doing autopsies, I'm flattered
- I think." He raised an eyebrow in her direction. "A certain
parental unit actually started it."
"Mom?"
"She wasn't telling on you. She called me a month ago to tell
me how much she had missed my not going to that Renaissance Fair in
Annapolis with you and your brother and his kids." This Dana could
believe. Her mother was always trying to draw Mulder into family
activities and very seldom succeeded. She just didn't understand
how painful he found such outings. "Then she asked if I knew why
you would buy a peasant outfit? If there was some occasion. You
wouldn't tell her."
Dana looked down at her full, tiered skirt and fingered the
soft cotton of the blouse. "I was wandering along this path
enjoying the sunshine while I waited for my nephews to finish their
turkey legs and I saw this booth. On a whim I bought these. I admit
I was thinking about how well they would go at the party tonight.
Did you tell Mom?"
"Of course not, besides it would only have been a guess. For
all I knew maybe you were thinking about taking up fortune telling
on the side, though I admit I was pretty certain you were thinking
about this." He hesitated his hands moving restlessly on the
steering wheel, eyes on the road. "Then you went off to Michigan."
Dana studied his profile carefully. Even in the dim light she could
see the lines of strain. He had missed her as much as she had him.
He glanced her way as if a thought had just occurred to him.
"You must have taken that outfit with you two weeks ago. That's
impressive considering what you knew you would be walking into."
His voice dropped a register, had become as soft and yet as warming
as a fine liquor. "Scully, you never cease to amaze me."
Unexplainably, Dana felt herself blushing.
"If you felt I wouldn't come after Michigan, what led you to
look for me here?"
A small smile touched his lips. "Elementary. You changed your
plane reservations. I thought your coming in on the morning after
Halloween was too convenient. When I found you had changed your
reservations from coming into National to Southern Maryland
Regional Airport via Newark I knew for sure. You hate Newark
airport. After that it was just a matter of hanging around the car
rental office and following you to your motel. Even then I waited
outside to see if you were going to change your mind." He sighed
dramatically. "I thought you were never going to finish getting
dressed."
"Why would I change my mind after coming this far?"
They were getting close. From time to time Mulder craned his
neck to examine the horizon and the clouds in the sky. "Your
ethical standards are impeccable - unlike mine. There are going to
be illegal substances flowing and floating about. We could be fired
if anyone found out and this party is just inviting a raid. To
stumble upon it unknowing as we did last year is one thing. To walk
in willingly, is another altogether. I didn't want you to risk
getting a black mark on your record because of me."
"You're making decisions for me again, Mulder. Do you want to
see real blood this time?"
"Withdraw your claws, woman," Mulder grinned, which was the
first time Dana could ever remember Mulder calling her 'woman'. She
should be angry, but the way he said it appeased her greatly. There
had been such warmth beneath the jest. And he had acknowledged for
one of the few times in their partnership that she was just what
she was - a woman. And a woman was what she wanted to be tonight.
"Claws withdrawn, only I think I'm going to exact a price for
your having insulted me at least twice tonight."
"Only twice?" Ah, so he had thought sure she was going to
bristle at the 'woman' line.
"I'm going to call you Fox for the evening."
"You are not."
"I am. And you are going to call me Dana and we are not going
to talk about work or think about work."
"I don't know if I can do that," he said worriedly.
"Try, Fox," Dana purred.
The underside of a patch of clouds to the east soon revealed
a red-gold glimmer as they reflected a dancing fiery light from the
ground below. There was the spot as a pencil mark on Mulder's map
agreed. Mulder pulled the car in very close to where they had
parked a year before. Both found themselves exiting from the car
with an unaccustomed spring in their step. From the trunk Mulder
pulled out the two bags of offerings for the party and Dana's thick
wool blanket. By peering in Dana noticed that another blanket lay
on the floor of the trunk and he made no move to retrieve it.
"Just one blanket, Mulder?" she asked over the open trunk.
"'Fox' remember?"
She glanced over at him a little surprised. "Right."
The tone of his voice had warmed her. She felt her heart
beating faster than it should. After all, there was no danger here.
Well, not their normal kind of danger, she thought, but perhaps
another. She had wanted this, had half-dreamed about this for more
than a year. Was she going to chicken out now?
Sadly, damn the nuns and her strict upbringing, yes.
Mulder was standing with his hand not moving from the raised
trunk lid. It was clear he could read the hesitation in her
expression. "What's wrong?"
"Mulder. What you said before in the car is true. It would be
hard to explain our being here to Skinner. But that's not what I'm
worried about. I'm clearly willing to take that chance. After all
I AM here." His expression which had shown initial disappointment
relaxed only a little. She clearly wasn't finished yet. "Being at
the party doesn't concern me nearly as much as hanging around
purposely to 'inhale'. Those are powerful hallucinogens as we found
out last year. More than a few people who have experimented with
LSD have lived to regret the experience. Flashbacks like those we
don't need in our line of work and really would ground us."
What she truly felt but hadn't the heart to say openly was
that Mulder, whose hold on reality was tenuous at the best of
times, didn't need his psyche troubled further by those kind of
intense dreams or other lasting complications.
Disappointment shadowed his handsome face. "What are you
saying? That you don't want to go?"
"No, just that I think we should leave before the heavy stuff
begins." Dana realized that the use of the term 'heavy' could have
more than one connotation here but she trusted Mulder to take her
statement to mean what she had intended -- that is, the release of
the psychedelics into the bonfire flames to drift in clouds of
vision over the participants.
He looked down dejectedly at the folded blanket in his hands.
"I guess we won't be needing this then."
Dana took the blanket from him and laid it over her arm. "Oh,
I don't know about that. It's going to get chillier as the evening
goes on and the ground is damp." That said Dana started off through
the rutted field which was knee deep in the tall grass and weeds
she remembered so well from the year before. Mulder, eyes opened
wide with a tenuous look of wonder, followed her needing only a few
strides from his long legs to reach her side.
End of Chapter 1
All HALLOW'S EVE II - EXTREME UNCTION (2/8)
By Sue Esty (Windsinger@aol.com)
For Disclaimer see chapter 1.
Chapter 2
Southern Maryland
October 31, 1996
They were soon in the narrow band of woods which was all so
familiar. The year before they had crossed this space with caution,
now they moved eagerly. With each step they left behind the slight
awkwardness of the moment by the car. A compromise had been
reached, not an entirely satisfactory one from either's point of
view but one both were willing to live with. As they drew closer
they saw the leaping flames from the huge blaze, an even larger one
than the year before. There were no drums as yet, just a murmur of
laughter, raised voices and the movement of many dark forms
silhouetted in front of the flames. They stood at the edge of the
trees not yet ready to venture closer. On the other side of the
fire they could see more forms just arriving. Dana had found a road
on the map which the teenagers must take to reach this spot in
their pickups and second-hand family sedans.
"We're earlier than last year," Mulder remarked. "They haven't
begun the opening ceremonies yet."
"But it looks like they're getting ready to," Dana said seeing
bodies begin to drift towards the fire. As they watched three
figures separated themselves from the others and headed in their
direction. One carried a Jack-o-lantern. By it's golden light they
both soon recognized the tall girl from the year before and her two
giggling companions. They at least wore more clothes than last year
having acquired a little more sense over the months. Dana noted
that all three had grown a little taller and had definitely filled
out.
"I thought we'd find you here," the tall girl said. As Mulder
handed her the bags of chips and candy she smiled meaningfully,
"Thanks, though I would prefer to take contributions in barter.
Still, be our guests. Enjoy. Oh, and don't miss the incantation. We
have a new high priest this year. He's very spooky." She began to
drift away with her friends then added in an aside to their
handsome visitor, "I really had hopes that you would have come by
yourself." With a shrug she was off.
Inclining her head after the three girls, Dana mused, "Give
that group a couple of years and they won't be jail bait any
longer. If I hadn't come, what would you have done, Mul... Fox?
Gone off with them? "
"No," replied the tall, dark form of her companion, "I
probably would have stayed right here near the trees and watched.
It wouldn't have been any fun without you." Dana felt a surprising
warm glow at his words. "What about you? You were ready to come
without me. I'll bet you wouldn't have sulked in the shadows."
"Mulder, brainy girls are the life of the party about as often
as brainy guys. I wouldn't have stayed here, I'm not that much of
a wall flower, but I would have picked up a drum and pounded away
until my head split and then I would have gone home. Playing with
the band, helping with the food, there's a lot of ways to keep from
looking like you've come alone. Believe me, I've had practice." She
gazed the long way up to where his face was hidden in the shadows.
"Besides, none of the boys here can dance like you."
"That might be a compliment," he said dourly, "but somehow I
doubt it."
Her fingers reached and moved feather light within the palm of
his hand. "Believe what you want, Fox, just remember to mark all
the spots on your dance card for me. Come on, they're starting. I
gather you want to get the full effect this year?"
Hand moving from his side to the small of her back he led her
out into the clearing. However, instead of heading towards the
bonfire immediately where a deep resonant voice was beginning to
chant, Mulder angled them to their left towards where the red coals
of a smaller, more well-established fire pit glowed. "Let's detour
and see what's on the menu for supper this year."
"Malted Milk balls and beef tongue?" Dana offered smiling.
They had almost reached the cooking fire when Dana sensed Mulder
recoil. Immediately she tensed beside him. "What's wrong?" After
taking a few more steps, the angle of the light was finally
adequate for her to see for herself what had disturbed him.
"A deer," Mulder announced soberly crouching before it. No
stuffed Bambi toy this but a real deer, a young six-point buck,
slender and strong in the glory of its manhood. In this case it's
throat had been ripped out in a very messy way.
Dropping down beside him, Dana found herself saying, "Poor
thing. Oh, I've read the statistics. With all their natural enemies
gone and less land to support them they just breed and starve, but
still it's a pity. They're such beautiful creatures."
Mulder brushed off his hands on his jeans as he rose. "It
wasn't a neat death but at least it was quick. Still, it just
doesn't feel right somehow."
Dana looked around on the ground. The makings of the stew were
there but the little things, the silly things like the Walmart's
baskets, the Barney toys and the gummy worms were gone. The
sonorous voice from the bonfire was raised to a thunderous volume
as if the speaker really was trying to wake the dead. "It's sad,
Mulder. It's as if they've lost their innocence. I'm sorry."
Dana didn't know why she should apologize but she just felt
that she should. She knew Mulder had looked forward to tonight in
a different way than she. He needed the crazy, on-its-edge, silly
strangeness they had found the year before.
He shrugged tiredly. "As they say, you can never go home again
-"
At that moment the voice of the high priest proclaimed -
something. Whatever it was it was in a voice of doom as if he were
indeed a god and could pull down thunderbolts from the sky if he
wanted. This was far from play-acting. As if in answer to a
summons, every drum and bell, cymbal and horn and tambourine burst
into a crashing, incredible din that just went on and on.
Somehow the two partners found themselves suddenly close
enough to each other to feel the heat of each other's bodies though
neither remembered moving. Icy fingers played about the skin at the
back of their necks.
"What the..." Mulder began when the sound had diminished just
enough to hear himself think. Before he could say another word a
woman screamed and a murmur of troubled voices rose from the crowd
around the bonfire. Immediately both Mulder and Scully's coiled for
action then forced themselves to relax just a notch to wait. Last
year they had been tricked by the 'play' more than once.
Another scream, this time a series of them and all from the
same terrified voice. This was no act. Like a wolf who smells the
blood of the hunt, Mulder sprang. Dana was as quick but not as long
of leg and so Mulder was the first to burst through the ring of on-
lookers.
What they saw made them pause.
A exceedingly tall, emaciated figure stood within inches of
the huge tower of flame. He wore no flowing cape of red or black
but thin, ragged strips of cloth that barely covered his stick-like
body. His thin body was stretched like a stalk of a tree planted in
the earth. His arms reached for the heavens. Stretched skyward
almost beseechingly towards the racing witch clouds, one talon-like
hand gripped a slender, long-bladed knife. He was crying out words,
phrases, stanzas, whole pages in a great and horrible language.
Mulder's mouth opened slightly and Dana swore she saw his lips move
slightly in time with the speaker.
"Mulder," she whispered, "what is it?"
"This fool really is trying to evoke the dead. Those are the
words of the black book, word from word, in ancient Saxon. I ran
into them as part of the Monty Props investigation years ago."
His speech completed, the figure brought down his arms
dramatically as if commanding an orchestra of demons. All the
instruments again screamed out as if they were indeed trying to
call to the dead in the depths of the earth. Dana cringed and put
her hands to her ears as the noise assailed her eardrums. At that
point the standing figure swooped like a great vulture. The point
of the dagger in his right hand was now directed towards the ground
where one of the young girls cowered paralyzed with terror. She
screamed again under the gaunt figure's terrible eyes.
Striding forward, Mulder's left hand darted out and encircled
the thin but iron wrist of the priest. "Stop it! This isn't a game!
You're frightening the girl."
From his stance a head taller than Mulder, the priest looked
down reproachfully at this impudent man who dared to thwart his
plans. With a flick of his body he brushed the offending hand away.
For the first time the two partners got a good look at the man's
face and wished they hadn't. The head was bare, hairless, and pale
as death. Both Mulder and Scully had seen enough bodies to know
that color well. The bones would have been pronounced even without
the black, skull-like cavities below the eyes. Within the
bottomless sockets themselves two red flames turned themselves on
Mulder.
"What do you think she finds so frightening?" came the deep
voice "My appearance or my suggestion that she do something truly
impressive with her life and become my sacrifice? Many have died
for less than that." Seeing that the priest's attention had left
her, the terrified girl at his feet scooted backwards beyond his
reach where anxious hands grabbed her by the arms and pulled her
into the safety of the crowd.
"Run, little rabbit," the priest said waving a dismissing
hand. "Pity, virgins are so hard to find these days, but I'm
content. I have heartier fare now. Come into the light, arrogant
man, so that I may see you better."
Ignoring Dana's restraining hand, Mulder took another step
forward, though not a large one. The fire was closer now than he
liked under any circumstances, but he would not have this creature
intimidating these poor half children.
Not taking his eyes from Mulder the priest casually flipped
his knife in the air and deftly caught it. "It's you... What a
surprise. I had wondered when we would meet again."
"We've met? That's odd, I can't remember having the pleasure.
I don't think I'd be likely to forget you."
"Because I am so unpleasant to look upon? You should count
your blessings one of which is surely that I am on holiday and
inclined to be lenient." The man smiled and the smile seemed all
sharpened teeth and gums on a face bare almost to the bone.
Dana drew alongside. "Why don't you leave these people to
their fun."
He turned his eyes on Dana and she felt as if tiny bugs were
crawling all over her body. "But what about MY fun which you two
well-favored mortals are ruining? That is, unless YOU would
consider being my sacrifice for the evening?" The demon stood back
and critically examined her with eyes like red lasers. An
expression of surprise and fearsome pleasure came over his skull
face.
"Tainted but not greatly and not recently..."
Evil seemed to ooze from every one of the man's pores just as
the sickening sweetness dripped from his lips. Sensing the malice
Mulder instinctively stepped protectively in front of Scully even
though it brought him even closer to the fire. He could feel its
heat uncomfortably hot on the left side of his face. He could
almost imagine it burning. It was hard to think completely clearly
with the flames this close.
"The world is a sad enough place," Mulder told the man in a
cold voice, "and it has made enough sacrifices to beings like you."
The priest's stark face stretched even thinner and whiter over
his bones as his smile broadened. "Beings like me? And what do you
think that is?"
"Does it matter?" Scully asked icily slipping in front of
Mulder. The tension between the two men could almost be seen like
a small black column of twisting smoke and she didn't want any more
trouble here than they had already. "You know what you are. Little
more than a theatrical bully. I agree with Mulder, you should
leave."
At the sight of her tiny form standing defensively in front of
her much taller friend, the white skin crinkled as if the thin man
were enjoying some private joke. Even so, his expression was able
to retain all of its former menace. "He thinks he knows what I am,
you think you can protect him from everything. What a playground of
possibilities. I shall have to give this some thought." The long
limbs rattled in a shrug. "Very well, I will go. Note, however,
that I leave not because you have ruined my game but because I
choose to. Certainly not as a result of any request of yours.
Besides, there are many other places I can spend a much more
profitable time." With a toss of that death's head the man made a
move to saunter by them.
As he passed, Mulder reached out and took hold of the man's
arm to find himself again repulsed by the thinness of the arm
underneath the rags. "I suggest you don't come back."
"Oh, I'll come back," the ragged man replied with that feral
smile. "I always come back. No one can escape that pleasure." He
began once again to walk away and as he did the crowd opened like
a silent wave before him. At the last moment before his form was
swallowed up by the darkness beyond the bonfire's light he turned.
"You think the world is sad enough? You have no idea how sad it can
be, but I think perhaps you will." At that he laughed and as he
vanished into the night that laughter came to sound more and more
like the cawing of an immense carrion crow.
The priest's departure left a void. Not that any of the
hundred or so teenagers could feel sorry to see him go but they did
seem stunned. They began to mingle among themselves, aimlessly
speaking softly in small groups. The spark had gone out of them and
the party. Surrounded by a cluster of dazed boys and girls a third
of the way around the firepit, the girl they had rescued was
weeping softly. Dana looked sadly from one group of young people to
the other. None glanced her way or Mulder's, not from any conscious
decision to exclude them, but because what they seemed to need at
this moment was the reassurance of their own kind. Bending down,
Dana seized a drum from one of many that had been dropped and began
beating out a driving, syncopated rhythm.
For a moment the young people stared and then as if swept up
by a firestorm most leapt into action, either grabbing discarded
instruments to add to the beat or jumping up to circle the fire all
arms gesturing in perfect precision. A hum in surprising unison
rose up from the teens as they danced. As if he thought all of them
possessed, Mulder's stood stock still his eyes so wide that Dana
could see the whites all around the hazel orbs.
"And where have you been all summer, Fox?" she asked slyly.
If the use of his name grated, he didn't show it. "Where I've
always been, with my nose in a book or in a case report. Wait,
isn't that the dance that they're suddenly doing at all the
baseball games?"
Leave it to, Mulder, an imbecile as far as much of popular
culture was concerned, to think that the Macarena was invented for
the seventh inning stretch. With sudden inspiration Dana handed the
drum to other eager hands and got to her feet. "Come on, Fox, I'll
show you how it's done."
Half an hour later, exhausted more from laughing than from
dancing, Dana dropped on the ground and began drumming again.
Everything she had gone through to be here tonight, even having to
deal with that horrible man, had been worth it if only because she
got to watch Mulder's tight little butt gyrating in the Macarena.
She had even given him a playful nudge a time or two when his ever
restless and inventive mind began to try out new variations on the
original dance which was highly suggestive enough as it was. Within
a very short time she was pleased to find him joining her. The
night was cooling quickly and she immediately felt the warmth of
his body as he sat down close beside her on the blanket which
shielded them from the damp ground. Dana drummed happily. Mulder
found a tin whistle from somewhere and concentrated on picking out
the theme music to Star Wars.
After what seemed like an interminable time, Dana's hand went
to her head and rubbed an aching temple.
"Anything wrong?" Mulder asked over the din.
"Just that if I have to hear the Macarena played one more time
like a war chant from Braveheart my head is going to split."
Smoothly he rose, reached for her hand and helped her up. "We
need a break and something to eat." He picked up the blanket, shook
it out and handed it to her. "Spread this out somewhere relatively
quiet and I'll get us some food. Maybe some nice safe soda and
chips and some of those candy bars you like."
"That's food?" she called after his tall figure, as it
retreated towards where the snacks and drinks were stockpiled, but
she was smiling. Dana spread the blanket on the ground beyond the
crowd and as far from the conflagration of percussionists as she
could get. She didn't necessarily intend for the spot for their
blanket to be outside the perimeter of the light thrown by the
fire. The important thing was that the compelling, incessant beat
was much reduced here and immediately the ache in her head
lessened. Mulder's return also helped considerably in that
department. He was all loose limbs and secret smiles. The night was
boding very well indeed. They ate, laughed, drank Coca Cola and did
not discuss work, all in perfect companionship until Dana pointed
out that they had company. The tall girl with her two giggling
cohorts were striding towards them. The leader had one hand behind
her back.
"We have a surprise for you."
"A surprise?" Mulder asked, mischievously
"Well, let's call it a precaution," the tall girl said with a
little coy smile.
Dana raised a warning hand in Mulder's direction. "Don't even
think it much less say it, Fox."
Her expression brightening, the tall girl said in awe, "Fox?"
"Don't ask," Mulder replied wearily.
The girl shrugged and gestured towards the ground. "Come on,
let me give you your surprise. Both of you just lie back for a
moment. Lay next to each other and close your eyes. I promise it
won't hurt."
Mulder stared at the girl skeptically but Dana could see his
eyes were dancing.
"Did you put them up to this?" Dana asked.
"Scully, I don't know a thing about it." Surprisingly enough
Dana believed him.
Carefully, they complied, Dana thinking less about what the
girl had in mind than the emotions surging through her own body as
she laid beside her long-limbed friend. A friend who was more than
a friend. But how much more? Would tonight reveal anything in that
direction? Dana felt her arm which was closest to Mulder's being
lifted and something soft wrapped snugly but not too tightly around
her wrist. There was movement near Mulder a few seconds later then
more giggles and the sound of feet skipping away through the tall
grass.
"All done!" the tall girl called from a distance. Dana felt
Mulder sit up and almost immediately felt a drag on her wrist which
pulled her upright as well. She opened her eyes to find that
someone had tied one end of a soft rope to her right wrist and the
other end to Mulder's left leaving only about two feet of free rope
between. Bewildered, Dana looked towards the girl and her
companions slipping like happy spirits back towards the fire.
Laughing, the girl turned around at the last moment. "We just
wanted to make sure you two didn't get separated this year."
Dana stared back down at their linked arms very afraid she was
blushing. A glance in Mulder' direction showed that he clearly was.
"Very considerate," he commented his voice a little rough.
"I guess you could call it that," Dana agreed but 'very
embarrassed' was how she was feeling at the moment. Her blood was
rushing in a most pleasant but alarming way. She could feel his
eyes on her even without looking in his direction. How she hated
bursting this particular bubble. "You know what this means, don't
you, Mulder? They're getting ready to move on to phase two of the
night's festivities."
Mulder's voice was heavy with disappointment. "The part we
agreed to leave before?"
She raised her eyes to find his glittering in the fire light.
"Right, that part."
There was a long pause during which neither moved.
Mulder finally said into the silence. "I guess we'd better go
then."
In the end they mutually untied their ends of the rope and got
slowly to their feet. They had sat too long, neither moving, both
waiting for the other to start to do something, to say something,
anything, to help overcome the inertia of their relationship. It
had been close, though, so incredibly close that Dana, at least,
felt unsteady on her feet.
That was when they heard from very close by a sudden, loud,
deep sound. It blared out at them, definitely animal rather than
human. Both jumped and stood still listening. There was the thud of
heavy hooves on turf and the wailing bellow again moaning in a lost
and mournful way like the howl of a wolf except that it was, in
fact, not anything at all like the howl of a wolf. As the initial
cry split the cool air the drumming and the chattering around the
fire had immediately ceased. The crackle of the flames could be
heard in the moments of silence that followed.
"What was that?" Dana whispered.
"I don't know," her companion replied stepping forward towards
the sound. "Not a horse and certainly not a cow but I'm going to
find out."
"Mulder, you're not armed. Don't you dare."
He turned to her a face relaxed and composed and wearing a wry
smile but his eyes had lost some of their glitter. "Dana, I have to
make certain that that priest didn't really conjure up some great
horned beast." And with that comment he was gone like a wraith into
the misty dark.
Swearing and clutching the blanket, Dana followed. There were
more bellows, farther away now, but, unfortunately, not far enough
away to force Mulder to give up the chase as hopeless. The chatter
and the sounds of drums around the fire had sprung back to normal
almost immediately after Mulder left. The other party-goers hadn't
been frightened, just surprised and even that had passed quickly.
Dana had taken a few more steps, the sounds around the bonfire
fading, when she felt a hand on her arm. It was one of the other
girls with whom she had shared drumming duties. The girl had risen
out of the grass as Dana went by. Dana could see the dark shape of
a boy still stretched out on a blanket awaiting her return.
"That's only Henrietta," the girl said. "Nothing to be
concerned about."
"Henrietta?" Dana marveled.
A dozen rapid words of explanation later and Dana was on
Mulder's trail again and hoped it wasn't too cold. She had only to
follow the bellows after all. The tufts of tall weeds threatened to
trip her but she kept on calling his name when she could catch her
breath.
"Mulder, stop!" she yelled. "It's not what you think it is!"
From somewhere in front of her in the dark came a cry, a
series of thuds, the crackling of bushes, the sound of an impact as
a solid form hit the ground, and then a shout of surprise, dismay
and pain.
"Mulder!" Dana screamed leaping forward.
Almost immediately from the dark only a few yards in front of
her but lower than her feet, Mulder's voice shot out, "Dana, be
careful! There's a steep drop off here!"
Dana crept forward slowly and felt where the land broke away.
Clearly Mulder had fallen down this incline which was more than
steep. It's edges were more like those of a ditch. It's interior
was in such deep shadow that even after giving her eyes time to
adjust Dana couldn't distinguish any details within, much less the
shape of her wayward partner.
"Mulder, that sound was a female moose with really mixed up
cycles," Dana informed him matter-of-factly. "She escapes from a
private animal preserve every once in a while and goes off trying
to court a big Angus bull one of the local girls is raising as a 4-
H project."
"Now, you tell me."
"I did try. What's your condition if I may ask? Are you in any
shape to crawl out of there?"
His voice coming from the black shadow was exasperated and
reproachful. "I didn't see the edge. I fell, rolled down here, and
got tangled in a whole lot of really nasty barbed wire."
Leave it to Mulder... "Can you extract yourself, oh mighty
hunter?"
"Not without losing more flesh than I already have," replied
his disgruntled, disembodied voice. "Could you do me a favor? I
have some bolt cutters in my trunk. I think we're going to need
them."
Shaking her head, Dana set off across the dark field her legs
now thoroughly soaked by the dew on the tall grass. Bolt cutters!
The man carried bolt cutters in his trunk. Of course. One never
knew when one would need to break into a high security government
facility.
End of Chapter 2
All HALLOW'S EVE II - EXTREME UNCTION (3/8)
By Sue Esty (Windsinger@aol.com)
For Disclaimer see chapter 1.
Chapter 3
Alexandria, VA
Dana Scully's Journal: March 2, 1997
It's raining today which fits my mood. One of those cold,
bone-chilling all day rains. Where I'd like to be is at my mother's
curled up in front of the fire the way I remember doing when I was
fourteen and searching for a direction, not a direction for my
life, but just a direction for the afternoon. This last few months
I feel as if I've been standing interminable guard duty. I must
stay alert but it's so difficult going around and around the same
hopeless track waiting for the inevitable, dreading it, but waiting
nevertheless. Yes, I'd like to go home but I won't because Mom
can't keep that look out of her eyes, the one which Mulder can't
bear. Besides, making the trip is so much trouble and it tires
Mulder out so. Best that we just stay here.
It feels odd to be writing again and writing about something
entirely personal. I haven't done that since my first year as an
FBI agent when I didn't know which end was up. Of course, I also
wrote plenty during medical school and residency when I really
needed a confessor even if the confessor was only in my own head.
Once I was joined with Mulder, however, there never seemed to be
time and the need, surprisingly, was no longer there. Perhaps that
was because almost from the beginning I had him to confide in.
Oh, I still wrote. I wrote volumes about cases. I wrote field
reports, both of the formal and informal variety so the writing
itch was thoroughly scratched, but I didn't write much about
personal matters.
Today, I feel the urgency to write again. I desperately need
to organize my thoughts, to decide which way to turn. I'm so
physically and emotionally exhausted, however, I can't conceive of
any other mode of living than just continuing as I have been these
past months - struggling just to put one foot in front of the
other. The energy needed to even contemplate changing direction
just isn't there.
For weeks I badgered Mulder about his trying to make a deal
with the devil and now here I am considering it. God, please, help
me to make the right decision. My whole life has come down to this.
Choose wrong and I will never forgive myself. The problem is, even
if I choose right I will probably never forgive myself.
First I'm going to take a moment to think back on that
Halloween night four months ago, to the feel of the long grass, the
sight of the orange moon, the glorious demonic decadence of the
bonfire, the vision of Mulder smiling wickedly and dancing his X-
rated Macarena variations, his body so strong and lithe.
Now, now, Dana... no tears. Haven't you had enough of that
over the last few months? Concentrate.
Mulder had fallen into a ditch - score one for Mulder - and I
needed to retrieve some things from the trunk of his car. I took a
wide detour around the fire and all of its possible inhalants and
collected one of our floods and the bolt cutters which were indeed
in his trunk along with a lot of other breaking-and-entering type
equipment. Made me wonder what my partner truly does on his off
hours.
I remember grumbling all the way back to where I had left him
because the cutters must have weighed twenty pounds but I forgave
him quickly when I saw how badly he was entangled in the rusty
wire. There must have been a hundred feet or more of the stuff
discarded in that ditch.
I gave him points that night for complaining as little as he
did. I came to realize long ago that the worse Mulder is hurt the
more silent he is. The little things, the cuts and bruises, the
injections, now those are the irritations he likes to moan and
groan over. Since this whole horrible business began, except for
the initial tests when he still felt well, I have barely heard one
word of complaint from Mulder about the pain. That shouts volumes
to me about what he is feeling. Oh, he has complained plenty about
other things, about how the Bureau shut him out of cases almost
immediately, about how food has lost its taste, about how badly the
Redskins did at the end of the season, about the rotten hand our
ol' buddy Fate has dealt us - but about the agony of his body
turning on him or the intimidating medical procedures he has had to
endure, nary a whimper.
By the time I pulled him out of the ditch that Halloween there
wasn't much left of his shirt. Thank goodness his boots and jeans
had protected him pretty well from the waist down and he had had
sense enough to protect his face and hands. The condition of his
arms, chest and back, however, was another matter. Too bad he had
lent his jacket earlier in the evening to some sweet, young thing
who should have had sense enough to dress for the weather. Some of
the scratches and punctures were quite deep.
With the blanket draped around his shoulders, we took the same
long way around to the car that I had taken. I remember him
muttering in a rather shivery voice, "Bets there's a tetanus
booster in my future."
Oh, there was that all right, Mulder, and, oh, how I enjoyed
jabbing the needle into that lovely ass to pay him back for how
badly he had scared me. (I could have used the upper arm, but, hey,
Mulder can be so trusting at times.)
I drove straight to the motel and dumped him in the tub in my
room. I still remember him sitting there all arms and legs except
for the wet towel modestly shielding his crotch and trying to
splash me every time I approached him with the large bottle of
iodine which I keep in my well-stocked bag of remedies for stupid
Mulder tricks. And he wasn't just being a pain because he was being
pissy about the color. He was blissfully enjoying himself. By the
time I was finished I may have gotten thoroughly drenched but he
was pink in lots of pretty embarrassing places that had nothing to
do with where he had been scratched. How we laughed. I'm glad we
did. There have been few laughs since.
The greatest regret I have of that night is of our not
sleeping together. How I long for one, happy untarnished memory to
add to my very meager collection in that department. Oh, we slept
together but not in the way people use that term. We were happy
just to be together. To be warm and safe and not to have anyone or
anything chasing after us at that moment.
I cling to that memory. Either that or -- I don't know what.
I guess it's an accomplishment just to survive. We're both just
surviving. One of us just barely. Sometimes it's hard to tell which
one.
When did the bad times start? What I noticed first was that he
started oversleeping in the morning. I was green for days thinking
he was spending his nights with some bubble-brained Miss November
from the secretarial pool and too embarrassed to tell me. Only
later did I learn he really was sleeping. So much sleep after so
many years of so little. Before I found that out, however, I had to
first suffer through a few more attacks from the green monster.
Mulder began spending far too many lunch hours making trips to
the corner drug store. At least that was what he led me to believe.
He always asked if I wanted anything but never asked me to come
along. What miffed me even more was that when he asked he always
had that sad Mulder way of not looking at me as if he was hiding
something he didn't want me to know. I figured he was meeting Miss
November for lunch as well as between the sheets and was willing to
swing by the drug store to keep up the pretense. Why he should feel
guilty about that, why I should be jealous - let's just say it
doesn't take a genius psychologist with an eidetic memory or a top-
of-her-class pathologist to figure that one out.
Then one day he left on his desk the bag he had returned with
after supposedly visiting the drug store over lunch. It's not my
style, but I couldn't stop myself. I peeked. I am an investigator
after all. Bandaids. That was all. Lots of bandaids. I felt a cold
shiver run down my back. The darkness behind his eyes, the slow way
he was moving, the late morning arrivals, the careful way he put on
and took off his coat began to make a horrible kind of sense. I
just hoped I was wrong.
I confronted him when he got back from archives his arms full
of files and he seemed relieved that I did. I think he had left
that bag on his desk on purpose. He knew without my telling him
that there was something wrong. That was at least part of the
reason for the darkness behind his eyes. It was fear. The deeper
scratches from the barred wire stubbornly refused to heal. 'That's
all,' he said trying to brush it off. They were tender and some
oozed still and the bandaids helped keep them from rubbing
themselves even more raw against his clothes.
By the time I pulled him moaning and complaining into the
oncologist's office that same afternoon I was shocked to find that
he had lost ten pounds since his last check up, he who can scarcely
afford to lose any.
I won't think about those next weeks. That hellish existence
of biopsies and needles, CAT scans and X-rays. And let's not
mention the death sentence which no doctor should ever have to hand
down and no patient should ever have to listen to. I will never
forget the look on Mulder's face that day, the fury. But it is the
first look he gave me after he learned the truth that I remember
more than anything - a naked realization of what we had both lost -
of what might have been and now would never be.
IT nearly tore us apart when it should have brought us
together, but Mulder was being Mulder and refused to be a burden.
He didn't want me hovering, watching him throw up for weeks on end.
He would lock himself in the bathroom for hours with the shower
running. His water bill was something horrendous those months.
I will give him credit - he never complained about going the
scientific route. I would have expected him to try the more exotic
options though, in truth, I think he was in too much shock to
resist me and the doctors at the beginning and later too weak. What
we fought about was his obsession about the priest from the
Halloween party. As IT ate at him, as he became thinner and
thinner, as his face became as hollowed as that creature's had
been, he was determined to go out and waste his little remaining
strength trying to trace the man down. We spent three days in
Southern Maryland and couldn't find anyone at the local junior high
or high school who knew where the man had come from. Then he began
making the rounds - spiritualists, parapsychologists, exorcists
(both religious and otherwise), palm readers, psychics, mediums.
Mulder was convinced he had been cursed. I thought I would go mad
watching his mind, none too sturdy before, begin to crumble into
dust around us both.
I was wrong to badger him. From his point of view he was doing
what he needed to keep his sanity, to look for an explanation of
why such horror must be. At least he had faith in something, I
certainly lost mine. That trail has gone cold now. All he has left
is the certainty that there is something - out there. 'Out there'
has just taken on a different definition of late.
If I had the strength to believe in anything right now I would
want to believe in vampires. Now who is being mad? Certainly my
fair and righteous God has let me down, destroyed my dreams and any
belief I ever had in justice. Even my science has let me down. I
don't think one of the painful and horrible treatments they have
tortured Mulder with has helped.
But vampires... if there were such demons I would go to them
with a bent knee and a bared throat and beg them to take him, to
bring him across. To make him immortal like themselves. If only so
something of him would live and live and live. And then I would beg
him to take me as his first feast or whenever he was strong enough
to take my blood and mingle it with his own. Afterwards we would
ride the night together. Hell, why not. We did that for years and
were supposedly normal.
I was anyway.
I thought about this over far too many long nights as I laid
holding him and feeling him struggle to find the strength just to
breathe.
Once more, Mulder. Just once more for Scully. And again... And
again... and again...
But I always come out of my waking dreams with the same
thought. That the undead, the immortal, are fairy tales. Horror
stories. No salvation in that direction.
Or is there? There is, possibly, one other way. It's...
obscene. It's far more frightening than vampirism. More disgusting
than Tooms or even that sick bastard Donnie Phaster. More
sickeningly terrifying even than waking up in the trunk of Duane
Barry's car or finding cold metal in my neck. More horrifying than
anything I have ever considered except the thought of that shining
mind and noble soul lying cold and dead in the ground. Silent. No
more life in those eyes.
Will he be appalled that I would even consider this? It would
be a way out. Granted, it's a back door, no it's more akin to the
access to a coal shoot which is hidden around at the servant's
entrance, under the stairs and below ground level.
I truly believe that given the choice he would prefer to be a
fiend, a demon of the night drinking blood, than to take on the
kind of life I am trying to decide whether to offer him. Ironic,
that after all the terrible things I said to him about the fakes
and the charlatans and the kooks, here I am contemplating a horror,
a sacrilege which to Mulder would be far worse than anything he
found out there. This is what I need to decide. From this point on
he will follow where I lead. Over the last weeks he has made it
clear that he has given up. He has come to the end of all the
threads he tried to cling to. He has put the rags and bones that
remain of his life into my hands.
I can't. I can't lead him down that devil's road.
Oh, God, make me worthy of his trust. Give me the strength to
give him what he needs now, my love and acceptance, my hand in his.
It's not the holding on that's the hard part, though. The hard part
is going to be the letting go.
******************************************
Dana Scully's Journal: March 5, 1997
I am a coward. I got up from writing my last journal entry and
went in to see him. There was such a look in his eyes. I realized
that he had been looking at me from those warm, peaceful depths for
a week at least. He was ready, has been ready. I think he is
waiting now only for me to tell him it is okay to leave the pain
behind. Please, not yet, Mulder. A few days more, I told myself.
Maybe a week. Maybe two.
But I wasn't given that. I wasn't given the choice. IT was
determined to take even that from me. A few hours ago he went into
convulsions. At the height of the seizures he died in my arms. As
I frantically strove with all of my skill and all of my strength to
bring him back something stirred in me, something of his fierceness
awakened what I thought had died. It wasn't just anger I felt for
not being able to say good-bye. I realized that while there was a
chance, any chance, no matter how abhorrent, I could not let him
go.
He woke me with his frenzied cries, the strangled, panicked
sounds a wild animal makes who is caught in a trap's steel jaws.
Those sounds cut me deep in places I thought were incapable of
hurting any longer. This was worse than what had happened in Alaska
because that death had been so silent. He had simply sat there in
that hideous metal tub, blue and cold, and as I argued with the
doctors his heart had simply stopped. Ground to a halt and stopped.
Without the monitors no one would ever have known, not until it was
too late. I brought him back then. I brought him back last night,
but other than that there was nothing similar about the two
experiences.
What I remember more than anything about last night was that
there was nothing silent about it. He was fighting still, cursing
still against the disease that dared to grow in him and eat all his
future away. He raved against IT and all its thousands of
individual hellish appendages that were stretched out like witches'
claws through all the channels of his body, lymph to muscle, muscle
to bone, sucking away at his life.
At one point his mouth opened in a wailing scream that went on
and on, higher and higher until there was no more sound, as if the
vibrations were too high for anything human to hear. His parchment
skin was stretched so tight across the beautiful bones of his face
that I thought I was looking for a moment at his skull. His stick-
like limbs flailed, helplessly as if they had more of a life of
their own than he had any longer. I wrapped my arms around his and
laid my body over his to restrain that animal terror and I felt
every rib. I had to hold him so tightly I thought he would break in
my arms. The points of his hips were so sharp they should have cut
me. The definition of the bones in his lower arm were like those of
a corpse.
Which for a minute or so he was.
It is so odd writing this. I read it over and I sound so cold,
no removed. I'm not. It's just the way I am. Cool in a crisis. An
excellent trait for an FBI agent, but not for what I am now. Which
is what? Partner, physician, wife, mother, nursemaid, sister,
friend? Friend still describes it best. He understands my restraint
and is comfortable that that's how I'm put together. He trusts me
to fall apart only later after the crisis has passed. And we both
know what 'later' he's talking about.
At the high point of that scream, body arched in a bow, joints
as hard as stone, fingers curved like talons around the sheet - he
suddenly crumpled. He folded exactly like a puppet whose strings
had snapped. I rose up on my knees beside him on our bed and did
impossibly sane things like take his pulse and check his mouth
which had been made sour by the drugs for an airway.
There was no heartbeat. No respiration.
That was when I disobeyed him. I went against his wishes and
his living will and my cross-my-heart-and-hope-to-die promise and
I brought him back. How could I not? I tore the top of the thin
pajamas he forced me to dress him in in a vain attempt to hide his
emaciated form from me. I opened the cardiac resuscitation
equipment which I had stored weeks before under the bed when the x-
rays revealed that 'IT' had grown into his spinal cord. I pulled
out the jell and the paddles. I did all that and then I shocked
him. Again and again and again I shocked him until I thought he
would glow in the dark. I shocked him until I had thrown aside the
enfolding wings of the dark angel and pulled him back to me. On the
ice flow in Alaska I refused to let her have him and I swore that
she would not have him now either.
Only after I had put the equipment away to hide my traitorous
deed did I put my arms around him again. Only then did I cry. I
cried like I had refused to do since that first day when the
prognosis came in. Inoperable. On a chemo drip of poison maybe two
months.
We have had four. We've beaten the odds once again, but for
the last time this time and not for much longer. But ready to go?
There was nothing in the animal I saw last night which was ready to
surrender. This is why I am writing this. To cry out in black and
white that I was wrong. Mulder go quietly? Never. So I called
Skinner last night. Even though my hands were trembling so
violently that I could barely punch in his number or hold the
receiver, I called Skinner. Yes, it was the middle of the night but
I needed to ask him to set up the appointment before I had a chance
to change my mind.
Forgive me, Mulder, but, if there is any chance at all I
cannot lose you. You should have seen yourself. You nearly pushed
me off the bed by the strength of your convulsions. Pretty good for
a man who hasn't had the energy for weeks to walk unassisted from
the bed to the bathroom. Of course you would never admit that. You
would always just smile weakly and say it was all an excuse to have
a lady's lovely arm to lean upon.
I have made the appointment and I will keep it. I can't delay
this any longer. Last night proved that to me if it did nothing
else. You cannot take much more of this and neither can I. It has
been a horrible four months, a rapid, sickening, destructive spiral
towards darkness. Well, I am tired of looking into the darkness. I
have to know if there's another way.
Amazing. That sounds so much like Mulder.
Investigation first then into the possibility. Then comes the
really hard part. Convincing Mulder because I will not do this to
him without his consent. I have waited, perhaps too long already.
What did the convulsions tonight do to his mind, his beautiful
mind? That is all that is beautiful left to him besides his soul.
If we follow the devil's road, they will take enough away from him,
I must leave him himself. What use is immortality to a bit of
produce, a stalk of wheat, a breath of wind.
******************************************
Dana closed her journal. She was so tired. Mrs. Hamilton had
come in the morning as she did almost every morning now and Dana
had left him in her care and gone back to sleep. She would need her
own strength today and a clear mind. She rose after a scant two
hours, showered and then dressed with more attention than she had
for many weeks.
As Dana emerged from the bathroom straightening the scarf at
her neck, the little old woman was standing at the doorway of the
small kitchen, a double espresso in her hand undoubtedly laced with
it's dash of bourbon. No tea for this former army nurse.
"Thanks for coming today."
The old woman's grey eyes were like steel. "Why didn't you
tell me he had had a bad night?"
"I did."
"Not as bad as this must have been."
Dana blinked. Her eyes burned. Had she cried again? When? In
the shower? After all these months she didn't think she had the
strength to cry so much. "I didn't want him to hear." Dana longed
to turn towards the window but refused to allow herself. Maybe if
she didn't see, the nightmare would go away.
"It's in his brain now, isn't it?" the spare old woman asked
bluntly.
Slowly, Dana nodded. "We got the latest MRI results back
yesterday but I knew already."
"He's known for a week."
Dana answered with a deep breath. She had to speak the words
because this woman needed to know. "He had seizures last night. Bad
ones. I gave him some anti-convulsives. He should be all right
during the day, but if it gets bad again call 911."
The old woman shook her grizzled head. "He said he doesn't
want that. He told me if that happened just to let him -"
"No!" Dana snapped more sharply than she intended though the
thin figure in the chair across the room did not move at the sound.
The old woman sighed. She pointed to the IV bags handing on
the poles above the lounge chair. Dana had bought him the chair two
months before when he began having trouble getting off the couch.
He had frowned at first saying only old men used such things, but
now he seldom left it during the day. Sometimes when the pain was
bad he even sat there all night because he didn't want to disturb
her sleep but she never slept any more anyway when he wasn't with
her. On the bad nights more often than not she just curled at his
feet and slept with her head resting against the bones of his legs.
Dana's attention slowly came back to what Mrs. Hamilton was
saying. "The studies are right about giving the patient control
over their morphine drip. He has always used a lot less than the
doctors allow. Until this week. He's been going through a lot more
since last Sunday, hasn't he?"
For the first time Dana looked towards the shrunken form
almost overwhelmed by the bulk of the chair and the pillows and
blankets that surrounded him. Nothing moved.
Mrs. Hamilton turned that way also, her expression bleak. "He
just dreams the day away now and never says a thing. I miss the
comments he used to make about my 'soaps'. The extra dialogue he'd
throw in. He used to make me laugh. I don't think he notices any
more."
Dana knew he didn't. As his body would only faintly be
recognizable as human any more, so his mind was no longer of this
world. For him death was no longer anything to fear. She knew he
only stayed now for her. She saw the darkness. He had turned
towards the light. "Remember, I've been through it before, so have
you," he had tried to tell her at the beginning. Anger, however,
had sustained him for longer than any of the doctors had expected.
Anger at having to leave his work undone, his vow to find his
sister unfulfilled - and her. Only in the last week had the anger
faded as the pain of 'IT' had become stronger than the pain of
having his life taken away. Death had finally lost the last of its
sting. On the contrary, it had become an enticing mistress offering
more comfort in her quiet, peaceful arms and the warmth of her
wings than Dana could offer any longer.
The widow began hesitantly, "Dana, honey, I didn't want it to
come to this, but I need to tell you. I can't take care of him much
longer. He may not weigh much but all those bones... Honey, you're
going to have to put him in a nursing home soon -"
Dana's lips pressed into a tight line. "Never."
"Some younger, stronger help then. I'll call the hospice if
you want."
Dana ran her hand over the suit she wore. It had been a while
since she had taken this much care to dress. Mostly she had run
into the office and brought back files or autopsy reports to
review. She had to keep on working at least minimally for her
sanity and the medical insurance. After today, however, who knew?
Who cared?
Mrs. Hamilton began to turn away then returned. She was
staring at her tea cup so she did not need to look directly into
Dana's face. "Dana, I did something yesterday I thought I should
tell you about. I know Fox isn't religious, but my priest came by.
He has seen me looking pretty glum lately at Mass and called to see
if there was anything wrong. He's a good man so I told him. He
offered to come and I thought, it couldn't hurt. Might help."
Clearly, Dana wasn't catching on. "Marie, I don't understand."
"They used to call it Extreme Unction, the last anointing."
The grey head moved from side to side, "but, like so many things,
times change. They call it the Annointing of the Sick now as if
that makes it easier. I hope you don't mind. I don't think he knew
Father Ryle was even here."
Dana's eyes closed. She had seen the shiny patch from the oil
on the broad, pale forehead but hadn't thought anything about it.
"That's all right, Marie. Didn't hurt and he wouldn't mind." Not
religious? That really wasn't true. Mulder respected all religions.
All the rituals of the human condition fascinated him. Especially
the ones surrounding death.
Reluctantly, Dana tore her eyes away from the figure by the
window. "Marie, if no one answers when you drop by tomorrow, use
your key."
The old woman cocked her grey head. "I don't understand."
"I'd rather not explain. Just that if we aren't here I'll
leave you a note and some instructions. Could you do that for me?"
The small woman, even shorter than Dana looked up from under
grizzled brows. She did not ask more but took up her cup of laced
espresso and went over to check on her patient in the chair. Dana
didn't hear a response to the woman's greeting. In a moment Marie
set herself down on the couch with her cup, some knitting, the
remote for the TV and Opra.
Slipping on her coat against the early spring chill, Dana
picked up her brief case. She stood by the door for a moment,
looking at the silhouette of that silent chair against the light
from the window. As a last thought, she stepped over to his side on
silent feet.
Mulder laid with head thrown back. He looked so small
surrounded by the pillows and foam pads which helped take the
weight off the pressure points. The chemo pump had not worked very
well against the aggressive invasion but at least it had allowed
him to keep much of his hair. Still, most of the physical beauty
was gone. He weighed probably half what he once had. The cancer
that riddled his body took most of it, the chemo the rest. Two
weeks previous the doctors had given up and so had he, and with
that acceptance a peace, a spiritual beauty glowed from within. He
was nearly on the other side now. It was that inner beauty she saw
as she leaned down to kiss him gently on the dry lips.
Dana thought he was too deep in his narcotic haze to notice,
but though he did not open his eyes, he did smile. Just that little
half smile of his. If she refused to look at those hollow cheeks
and the dark holes into which the eyes had sunk, she might have
been able to convince herself that it was her old friend back
again.
"Mulder, promise me something," she whispered near his ear.
His eyes opened a slit and slowly his head turned ever so
slightly towards her, towards the other light in his universe. He
had heard. She wasn't sure that he would.
"Promise me not to die today."
She had never asked him this before. Despite his unspoken
offer not to go willingly until she was ready she had never asked
him to live with the agony, the weakness, the humiliation one
moment longer than he wanted to.
His lips moved. At first no sound came out, then he made the
effort and tried one more time. "Okay, S-Scully," came the voice
like dry leaves against stone. "For you." She detected the hint of
a question in that whisper, a flicker of interest. She was right.
It gave her courage, it gave her hope. Something lived still,
fought still, questioned still within that wasted form.
She touched his cheek. "Trust me. Sleep now. I'll be back in
a little while and then we'll talk."
"Not going anywhere." The words came out all at once like a
sigh.
At the door, Dana fought against looking over her shoulder one
last time. Extreme Unction. She took a firm grip on the handle of
her brief case. Extreme measures were needed, that was one, Dana
had her own.
End of Chapter 3
All HALLOW'S EVE II - EXTREME UNCTION (4/8)
By Sue Esty (Windsinger@aol.com)
For Disclaimer see chapter 1.
Chapter 4
FBI Headquarters
March 5, 1997
The corridors of FBI headquarters were nearly silent.
Saturday. Dana wondered how she could have forgotten except that
time had no meaning any more except that it was moving far too
quickly. She passed a young girl in well-fitting jeans barely
recognizing the agent who would have been found dressed to the
'nines' three years before. When Mulder and she began coming into
work on weekends back then, the staff still wore the 'costume' even
on Saturdays. Now it was business casual. Dana smiled sadly. Maybe
they had started a trend.
She missed seeing Brenda stationed outside of Skinner's
office, missed the raised eyebrows as the woman wondered what her
boss's troublesome team was going to try to slip by The Skin this
time. In truth, Dana reminded myself, it had been months since the
woman's face had worn that bemused expression. Now the secretary
always found something terribly important to be doing when Dana
appeared so that she didn't have to look at her. Everyone did that.
Was grief that visible, that painful to look upon? Maybe it wasn't
grief but the chill from the ice Dana had surrounded herself with
again, the ice Mulder alone had been able to melt. More likely it
was the smell of the grave she carried about her which
instinctively all men fear.
Your mind is wandering again, she told herself. Her thoughts
kept creeping back to 'IT', 'IT' and all that 'IT' was doing to
consume all of the joy from their lives. That was one face of
death. Now she went to meet another.
She was early but the day was dreary so the lights could
plainly be seen to be burning already in Skinner's office. There
was no sound, however. With a cleansing breath for courage she
knocked.
Instantly Walter Skinner opened the door. His face wore that
same solemn expression it had for months, the one he saved for
funerals, but Dana did not think he wore it just for her benefit.
He dealt with his own grief. He had lived with this in his own way
every second of every day just as she had.
"Is he here?"
"He's here. Agent Scully, are you certain you want to go
through with this?"
Curtly, she nodded and walked past him, nearly shouldering him
aside, needing to move before she lost her nerve. The tall, cold-
faced bastard was sitting as expected beside Skinner's desk, his
form shrouded in exhaled smoke from the obnoxious weed.
Dana felt hatred and despair surging up within her. Dear, God,
why couldn't he be the one imprisoned in that damned chair at this
moment, his body nothing but bones and ravaging disease, his mind
full of pain and longing for death? She could see him lying there
instead of Mulder without feeling the slightest shred of guilt.
"I was wondering when you would ask to see me, Agent Scully,"
the devil in the business suit said, casually flicking ashes into
a styrofoam cup. She stood before him, drawing up her entire five
foot two and then some by the straightness of her back. There was
no fear, only hesitation as to how to start. The man waved a
cigarette-occupied hand in the direction of an empty chair. "Please
sit down, Agent Scully."
With exaggerated poise she sat.
"Do you want me leave, Scully?" Walter Skinner asked. Just
'Scully'. This was not Bureau business. Interesting, Skinner was
bristling around the edges as if he wanted to smash someone's head
in.
"No, don't go." Dana hoped her voice didn't betray her concern
about Skinner leaving. She needed Skinner here to witness if
nothing else. That and to get her through this with her dignity
intact. His strength was as clear and real as Mulder's had been
and, in ways that were not physical, still was.
"Let me start," the Shadow Master offered unhurriedly, his
gestures so insultingly languid that Dana wanted more than anything
else at that moment to plant her fist in his sneering face. "Dr.
Sacare."
Dana didn't flinch. Of course, he would have guessed. "That's
why I came, yes."
Skinner frowned also not the least surprised. By the level of
cigarette butts in the cup and the dampness of sweat on Skinner's
skirt and on his considerable brow, the two men had clearly been
discussing this option before her arrival.
The Smoking Bastard continued. "You want Mulder in the same
program Dr. Sacare was in. What makes you think we still have one?"
"You do." Dana didn't have any proof, didn't need any. She had
her knowledge of him and his kind and that was enough.
An unconcerned breath oozed through the man's nostrils. "Agent
Mulder must have told you what we allowed him to see in that
warehouse. How does he feel about the prospect of joining such a
select group?"
"I haven't discussed it with him. I wanted to know if it were
possible first. Besides, as you can imagine he's been -
preoccupied. If Agent Mulder's considered this on his own, he
hasn't told me."
"If he's still the Fox Mulder I've come to know, he has. He
either doesn't want it or thinks you don't. You may be his next-of-
kin but he needs to go into this willingly or there's not a chance
in hell of it working."
"Hell may be what I'd be handing him over to."
The S.B. leaned back in his chair and crossed his legs. His
face held no sympathy which was just as well. Dana didn't think she
could have sat there if he had. Only hate would get her through
this. Hate was what she wanted to feel and he was making that very
easy. Mixed in with the anger, however, was the tiniest spark of
gratitude. This man may be the devil himself but he was speaking of
Mulder as if he were still a person, not the way other people did,
not as some temporary bag of bones and a little skin clinging to a
bit of pain-racked life.
The smoke rose in lazy clouds towards the ceiling. "It's
possible," the man said. "The others in the program, if anything,
were even further along before they agreed to sign on. Literally at
death's door."
Your spies are slipping; he's closer than you think, Dana
thought. Within, her heart was pounding in both panic and undared
for hope and yet on the outside she betrayed not a sign.
The drag on the cigarette was long, the exhale of the noxious
smoke longer. "You understand, it's an irreversible decision."
Dana bit her lip, furious that this man was taking entirely
too much pleasure in drawing this out. "I know. He knows. Sir," she
began nearly choking on the honorary, "I don't have time for games.
This thing is beginning to affect his brain. I don't want that."
A shadow actually passed over the S.B.'s face. A stunned...
sadness? But the shadow was quickly covered. "I'm sorry to hear
that. You are right then. Almost past time for us to become
involved. Some of the others - well, we waited too long. We
harvested zombies. Bodies with no brains. Not normal ones anyway."
He was waiting for her to react, to speak. He continued when she
did not. "I must admit, Agent Scully, we're concerned about having
Agent Mulder in this program. He will never submit to the
restrictions we'll require if he survives. You understand they will
be life-long. No unsupervised contact with anyone. Very little
travel outside the Compound. Naturally, continual testing and
experimentation. All in exchange for life. Frankly, I think he
would be too difficult to handle and not worth our trouble. I've
said as much to the group. Again I ask, why should we?"
"Because you've never had anyone like him before, never anyone
who will fight the way he will. And you will also have me."
The snake eyes glittered. "I thought so. You offer yourself as
a hostage for his good behavior?"
"No, as a physician, a colleague, a researcher to work on his
case."
"If we agree to this you won't just work on his case. There
will be others," the S.B. insisted, his face hardening as the real
bargaining began.
"And others," she reluctantly agreed, "but only on projects
intended to save life, not on any whose ultimate purpose is to take
it."
The cigarette in the long nicotine-stained hand dipped.
Agreement. Grudging agreement but agreement. A shiver started at
the base of Dana skull. This could actually come to pass.
"You will be in danger from the extreme toxicity of his
secretions. ALL of his secretions." The man snuffed out his
cigarette though there was life in it yet. More than Mulder had. As
he lit another, he leaned back in his chair and stared at her as a
cobra mesmerizes its prey. "I hear you were married the day after
the results from NIH came in."
Dana shot Skinner an accusing stare. "No one was supposed to
know about that!"
Skinner's jaw tightened, his shoulders twitched slightly in
denial. "I didn't tell them, Scully. You should know by now what
they're capable of."
The S.B. opened his hands, a quarter inch of ash drifting to
the carpet under Skinner's scowl. "Does it matter how I know? I
know. If he survives - and that is not a given, not all do, very
few do, in fact - if he survives even normal marital 'activities'
will be extremely dangerous for you."
"We'll manage," she insisted in a voice that would freeze in
hell, "just as long as we're together."
The S.B. let out a long trail of smoke. "I should have
bargained with you long ago, Agent Scully. I underestimated you.
He'll be inside then, you know. Where I always intended for him to
be, where I always intended both of you to be. Do you know what he
was to us? Why we let him live when he kept coming back and back
like some deranged terrier? I can tell you now because he will
either die or he will be ours. He was our litmus test. If we could
keep the truth from him, we could keep it from anyone. We'll need
a new one now but we would have regardless. So if you had any
suspicions that we 'caused' this, and I am certain that you do,
dismiss those thoughts from your mind. He was far more useful to us
as he was."
Dana sat silently. What more was there to say? The palms of
her hands, her thumbs, itched horribly.
Another cigarette came out of the pack. "I'll have a private
ambulance come to Agent Mulder's apartment at eight this evening.
If you can convince him, have him ready. Don't worry about packing.
We'll arrange to have everything you need brought to you and the
rest stored for the time being. Is that acceptable?" He looked
towards the ceiling adding more fumes to the dark cloud above his
head, not expecting an answer. Dana had been dismissed, no longer
of any consequence.
********
Mulder was awake when she returned, more awake than she had
seen him for weeks. The pain lines around the parchment skin of his
half-opened eyes, however, were like spider's webs. His alertness
did not come without a price.
She actually was able to blurt out a half dozen sentences
before he spoke.
"They killed your sister, my father!" The words burst out of
him, in a raspy, whispery voice.
"They're the only game in town, Mulder."
"I'll be their prisoner!"
"You'll be alive!"
"I won't be their damn guinea pig!"
"And if you are, then they'll have a mating pair because I
won't leave you. Ever." Dana knelt on the floor so he wouldn't have
to struggle to look up to see her. "Mulder, I know you, I know
you've thought about this."
Eyes blazing, he had to pause for breath after his outburst,
his thin chest labored as if he had just ascended a high mountain.
"I did."
"You should have included me. It was my decision, too."
"I don't trust them."
"And you still had hope then."
"There was still hope."
Past Tense. No longer.
He didn't say more but he had said enough. Dana had read the
signs right. This incredible spirit would never be ready for death.
Even now he refused to say clearly that there was no hope. He would
go into the dark - or the light depending upon your point of view -
still hoping for that miracle.
She placed her hands on his knee, lightly so not to give him
pain. "Mulder, no one is coming to save you. The brilliant blue-
white light is not going to spirit you away to a magical
extraterrestrial ship where they are going to make it all better.
You DIED in Alaska, You DIED in New Mexico. Mulder," her voice
suddenly dropped to a harsh whisper, "you DIED last night."
His eyes widened in their black sockets. A skeletal hand moved
shakily towards his chest. "I wondered why this hurt so." His eyes
narrowed down. "I should be angry at you."
"Go ahead if it makes you feel better. Just remember, no one
came."
"You did."
Dana closed her eyes and clamped her lips shut to keep them
from trembling.
Silence, except for the wheezing of his breath as he fought
for strength to begin again. "We haven't talked like this for a
long time."
"It's better than the alternative."
"Not talking at all, you mean." His bruised eyes stared off at
a point above her head as if he were looking at his future in that
other world beyond the white light. He was frowning as if he did
not especially like what he saw. "Do you honestly think we can
trust them in this?"
"No, but what choice do we have? Skinner knows. He's my
witness and our lifeline. He'll see that we are treated with
respect. And you'll be alive and we'll be together and on the
inside." She edged closer to him, seeing a hint of interest in his
eyes. Was it possible that he could be convinced? "Mulder, we've
seen a lot of changes. We know that the Consortia fight among
themselves. The 'visitors' fight among themselves. There could be
a shift in the balance of power. We could be part of that. I know
it's a slim chance but we've faced tougher odds. If you are dead,
there is no chance."
His eyes narrowed. "Like Lotto, you can't win if you don't
play?"
Dana didn't know whether to kiss him or strangle him. Jokes at
a time like this. She kissed him. "Mulder, you're terrible."
"I try." A sigh came out shaky and thin. "I can't see our
local smoking SOB agreeing to this."
"He did, but believe me, he wasn't jumping up and down at the
idea. Mostly he's concerned about being able to keep a leash on
you."
The tiniest of smiles. "The prospect of messing with their
minds... almost makes it all worthwhile."
Dana shared the image with the tiniest of smiles of her own.
"We'll have to accept curtails on our freedom, but talk about
letting the fox into the chicken coop."
"A cage is still a cage."
There it was. The ultimate roadblock.
His voice sounded so weary and bleak at that moment, all her
hopes crumbled. Rising she went to the window, the one that had
worn the 'X' for so many years. She looked out for just a moment
and then turned back to him. "If that's worse than death then we
won't speak about it anymore. When the car comes tonight I'll send
it away and I'll take you into our bed and you will go to sleep in
my arms and that will be the end of it."
He laid his head back, not only with exhaustion but so he
could look into her eyes which told him how desperately he was
loved, how desperately she wanted this and yet how frightened that
he might agree. He couldn't live on nerve much longer and they both
knew it. Once this hope was gone there would be no more and he
would fade away very quickly, burnt out, and leave her behind.
"You always were quick, Scully. You're right. If I say no, it
will be over."
She came to his side and wrapped her hand within his. "The end
of all things, or the beginning of - something. Alone or together?
Personally, partner of mine, I choose together." She knelt again
and shamelessly laid her cheek feather light on that hand that held
hers. "I was thinking what it would be like to make love to you
again. I can count the number of times on the fingers of one hand,
you know."
His lower lip, dry and chapped as it was, protruded sulkily.
"You really know how to hurt a guy. But that wasn't making love.
That was howling at the moon. That was spitting on the face of the
Almighty. You haven't seen how I could make love to you."
A tightness welled up in her chest. Now that was a decision.
She felt it in his voice, stronger than she'd heard in days, saw it
in the light in his eyes that swept over her in a way that was
almost sexual but in a distant, hungry way as if he had forgotten
what the emotion felt like.
A car's deep horn blew outside. Dana jumped. Reluctantly she
tore herself away from those eyes. Trembling too strongly to move
quickly she allowed her hand to trail along his thin shoulder as
she went to the window, there to look cautiously down into the
alley below. A huge black limo waited. There was a driver, a man in
black naturally, and two white-coated medical staff. Our jailers,
our Dr. Frankenstein, our salvation. She stretched out her hand to
his, he had only to take it.
A stick-like arm moved, the fingers of his hand looking
impossibly long in their thinness reached for hers as he struggled
to get out of the chair. She went to his side and took most of his
meager weight in her arms until he was upright.
"Does this mean I'm going to be an X-file?" he asked with a
weary twinkle in his eyes.
Gently she wrapped a blanket around his shoulders. Her arm
went around his waist, his breath brushed her face. "You were
always an X-File to me, Mulder."
End of Chapter 4
All HALLOW'S EVE II - EXTREME UNCTION (5/8)
By Sue Esty (Windsinger@aol.com)
For Disclaimer see chapter 1.
Chapter 5
Dana Scully's Journal
The Compound
Day 94
Don't scold, I know I haven't written in a long time. What
with working all day and spending so much of each night in the
incubation room, I haven't had the time. Tonight, however, I'm so
excited I can't sleep. Not that I sleep very well here anyway. How
long has it been since I've slept through even six hours? Weeks,
months? Not that weeks or months matter anymore. Days are all that
count here, days till your 'birth' date. Day one hundred twenty was
their last estimate.
Nearly there, Mulder.
I need to tell you about today. Not that I haven't already, I
just came from your tank where I said it all to you but it is a
public place after all and much as I like Louis and Grace I just
couldn't release everything that is in my... heart. (All right,
I've gone and said it, so call me a bleeding Romantic.) To make up
for what I couldn't say there I'll write this, which I should have
started long ago, and it will be something you can hold in your
hands when you wake up which will tell you about this time.
They let me touch you today.
That doesn't sound very exciting does it? It fuels my fires
though. I feel as giddy as a school girl in the flush of early
hormones and I could care less who knows. They could all see it on
my face anyway just as I could see it mirrored in their expressions
and behind their little secret smiles. Understand, their happiness
is not just for me but also for themselves. The doctors and the
nurses and the attendants here need success stories just like
everyone else and my happiness is in many ways theirs.
Success story? Seems a twisted Friday-the-Thirteenth type of
success story but that's the way it appears tonight. They caution
me about being overly optimistic but they don't know Fox Mulder.
They don't feel the power of your personality even through the
tank's thick wall, the hundred gallons of nutrient solution and the
enforced coma.
I hated this place ninety-five days ago when I first stood
shivering in that cold, inhuman receiving room. I know it well now
but the morning after our long journey in the black limo with its
silent attendants, it felt like the fifth circle of hell.
You were barely conscious. You had worn yourself completely
out during our talk. That and the stress of the long ride had
nearly finished you. I will never forget those doctors. There must
have been a dozen standing over your naked bones, over what was
left of your beautiful body which the cancer had not devoured,
shaking their heads, telling Dr. Esaki, the head of the program,
that this candidate was too far gone, that it would be a waste of
time and resources. Their combined opinion was that we had waited
too long and you would never survive the required surgery to put in
the umbilical line and the artificial gills much less the stress of
acclimation.
I reasoned. I begged. I'll admit it to you, I pleaded. They
shook their collective heads. It was Dr. Esaki who finally voted
with me. He had heard of Fox Mulder, as they all had. You are
rather well known - sort of a one man terrorist organization. Dr.
Esaki, however, also knew something of your strength and your
tenacity, but though he was the Director of the medical compound,
he was only one man.
Standoff. In the end HE was sent for. The soft spoken one with
the lilt of the English accent. Even on first meeting he seems the
kind of man one can trust but never, ever should. He came and
commanded your inclusion in those rolling BBC tones of his. How can
evil be spoken so prettily? He even patted my hand, but I was so
furious at that moment I nearly bit it off.
And so, for good or ill, you were in. I felt like a fly
walking into a nest of spiders. I was truly thankful that you were
so out of it that you felt little. Still grumbling over the waste
of time and materials, they proceeded with the operation and you
surprised them. You survived. Somehow you clung to some thread of
life just as you clung to my hand. Under the sedatives - they were
too afraid you would not survive a general anesthetic - your grip
was such that the bones of my hand were bruised for a week. Oh, how
I wished that the bruises had remained for a month, even two. But
it was the drowning, what they call 'the acclimation', which was
the worst.
They said it would be harder for you than for the others but
that there was nothing they could do because they couldn't wait for
the incisions around the artificial gills or the umbilical line to
heal. You were too far gone, too close to death. I've seen others
on D-Day since then - that's Drowning Day, the day the incubants go
into the tank - and yours was the worst I've witnessed. It was
either the pain, even sedated, your terror over loss of control, or
just plain animal instinct to fight death - I can't blame you
either way.
They had to force your struggling wasted form into that oily,
green fluid. Not by their own hands and brute strength, however.
That might contaminate the culture media which is what you are
living in by the way - a huge tissue culture flask. What I'm saying
is, they don't lower the incubants in reassuringly wrapped in human
arms. No, they have a machine that does that, a machine whose parts
they can sterilize. Perhaps you would not have been so terrified if
the hands that forced you down had been, not metal ones, but mine.
I'm working on helping them change this procedure for the future
but for you this was how it was.
They had sterilized you, too, inside and out, every last bit
of waste gone, every last hair from your body - oh, that beautiful
hair we had fought the doctors so to save, even the lovely chest
hair you always wished had been thicker. The machine was brought
forward - a chrome and aluminum spider the size of a fork lift.
That is, by the way, what they call it - the Spider. It latched
onto your upper arms and thighs with four of its pincers, drew you
up towards where a spider's maw would be, then it crouched over the
tank Louis had prepared for you and forced you down, down....
How you fought, my love, how you screamed.
I can understand why, I just cannot understand how. Where did
you find the strength? You were little more than naked skin
stretched tight over bones. You had been a near invalid for all
those weeks before. But there were your hands, all those long,
fragile bones and rope-like tendons looking like skeleton hands,
flailing to grasp for the sides of the tank, your legs thrashing,
your mouth gaping wide in horror, your back bending and ribs
bulging. Your eyes were huge and staring blindly in terror, blind
both from the huge contacts they had placed over your eyes to
protect them from the chemicals and because you were not really
conscious.
Or that's what they told me again and again. That this was
merely an autonomic response.
Bullshit.
I called to you, how I called to you not to fight it, not to
be afraid, though I was sobbing so hard you probably could not have
understood me. It was Louis, huge, strong Louis, who held my arms
that day to keep me from plunging myself into the tank with you, to
keep me from screaming and frightening you more. Though how could
any person be more frightened than you at that moment? My arms felt
so empty. Since your 'decontamination' I had not been allowed to
touch you. That was the hardest part. After years of our loving but
being too restrained by protocol to touch, then those last horrible
months when all I did was touch you while we waited for you to go
into the dark - now, suddenly, when you needed me most I was
forbidden even to hold your hand.
So many die in those first minutes. Minds that are not strong,
even nearly comatose ones, cannot tolerate the thought that a
person can live like that. Bodies that are too strong fight too
hard and burst their hearts. I've done the autopsies. I've seen it.
In this regard you were the perfect candidate. Too stubborn to die
and, yet, too weak to fight the invasion of the warm, slightly
oily, salty fluid into your lungs for long.
From the coldness of certain death in this world we drowned
you to breathe a fluid laced with alien proteins for four long
months and all so that you could have a small chance for a kind of
continuance as something half-human and half... something else.
X-files material, Mulder, without a doubt.
I sat by Tank 42 for three days. No one tried to make me
leave, but no one brought me food or talked to me either after the
first day.
Tank 42? Don't laugh. They let me assign the ID and that was
something I thought you would approve of. Amazing how many of the
staff got the joke. From the very beginning I hoped it's uniqueness
would make you something special in their eyes.
Following those initial minutes you were completely passive.
Not a muscle moved. Not one. I know this for certain because there
are sensors everywhere, tiny, tiny sensors. From the description
you gave me of the twelve incubants you saw in the Zeus storage
warehouse in Germantown, the technique has become considerably more
sophisticated and high tech over the years. Every life function and
every movement is monitored. By comparing your readings to those of
the other incubants when they turned in their sleep I soon learned
which instrument recorded movement. You can believe me, you didn't
move.
At first I was numb. I had done this. Brought you to this. You
wouldn't believe how guilty I felt. No, that's not true, you know
all about assuming guilt. You're an expert. I assumed yours then.
Not the type to sit on the sidelines for long I began asking
questions. Of Louis first. Louis is the huge technician who runs
the ward at night. He is the one who held me back, firmly but
gently, but held me the night you went into the tank.
Louis is not a nurse, after all the incubants don't need a
nurse. What they need is an engineer, an electrician. Louis is all
that and more. I found over the next few weeks that Louis knows
everything about every piece of equipment down to the last
capacitor. My questions brought me out of myself. I needed to
learn. If there was any chance of helping you I needed to learn.
And as desperate as I was to learn, Louis was as eager to find an
apprentice and to teach. Which is why I can tell you now that your
vitals were flat. Not only no movement but minimal respirations,
metabolism, pulse, blood pressure. Comatose at its deepest level.
But though your readings were minimal the staff seemed grimly
surprised that you weren't 'going down', as they call it, and,
therefore, the signs were not necessarily all bad.
Going down? You? I didn't see how that was possible. You lay
at the bottom of the world. How could you fall any farther?
Two weeks passed, two weeks of my fading into zombie mode
every time I let my mind contemplate what we were doing here, and
still there was no change. One evening when I was dragging my tired
body towards the main isolation facility from the morgue, Grace
came flying out of the side door to find me.
I've said that I came out of myself if for no other reason
then to learn about your new environment and my own and to see how
I could help. But there was another reason. There was their promise
that we could become part of the team in time which is critical if
we are to have any kind of life after your recovery. You scoff, I
know, but I have found over the months that the medical compound
staff here are amazingly true to their word when they are convinced
we will keep ours. In a way they are as paranoid as you ever were.
So I was given work when I asked for it, but not the work I
would have chosen. They dropped me down into grim, stark, horrible
reality. They had me doing autopsies on the incubants who went
down. All the way down. The ones who died. I think it was a test to
find out just how strong I was. You can be proud of me. I surprised
them. I amazed them. Didn't they understand that I would walk
through hell for you? If they didn't at first, they do now.
As I said, Grace, Louis' partner on nights, ran out of the
building early that spring evening just after the sun had set. I
heard her sensible nurse's shoes pounding on the concrete walk
before I saw her. With her fifty year old hands, dry from the latex
gloves and cleaning fluids, she grabbed my arm, excited, exuberant,
like a child. "Dana, hurry! You have to see this!"
She dragged me to your tank and happily showed me the graph
currently on the status monitor. There had been a change. A rise of
one of the little green lines. By measuring the amount of culture
media needed hourly to replace evaporation in the tank and
calculating for the humidity, air movement and temperature of the
room the computer programs here can calculate the mass of the
incubant. I stared from the screen to your poor body. Such a small
wizened thing little more than a skeleton covered with skin, like
a victim of the holocaust down to your poor shaved head. Bones,
bones. But the instrument indicated that you were gaining weight.
That same night I began the Dana Scully lecture series. I
pulled a chair up next to your tank, put my cheek against the warm
glass and I talked. I talked for hours. I didn't care if Louis or
Grace heard which is why I waited for their shift. The staff keep
up a fairly loud but pleasant music in the incubation room here
though they won't come out and say that the incubants can hear.
Having convinced myself that at least on some level there was a
chance that you could understand me, I talked to you. Sound, after
all, can travel in a liquid, and I didn't want you to feel alone.
It felt odd at first, like talking to myself, but that wore
off. After all I've had years of experience talking to you when
your thoughts were a million miles away. I told you everything that
had happened to me, to us, and when I couldn't think of anything to
say we read books together. Well, I read, you listened. We went
through the entire Chronicles of Narnia that way. Louis became an
avid fan. My lectures and readings became a daily ritual which is
why I never felt the need for a journal before now. I didn't think
I needed it and I really didn't have the time, but more than that
I felt in my heart that you already knew everything I could ever
set down on paper.
On the trip here, I think we both assumed that the attendants
and doctors at this place would resemble the Wicked Witch of the
West and Dr. Frankenstein. Except for the physicians of the highest
ranks who deal in abstractions and who are too afraid to smile, you
would be amazed at how wrong we were. They are, from what I can
tell, good, competent and caring people. As you can tell, Louis is
my favorite, all six feet three and three hundred pounds of him.
How he can manipulate those tiny gears and wires in those huge,
dark hands of his I will never know. Grace has become my special
girl friend. We go to her room or mine and talk and often we eat
together in the commissary. There are other excellent staff, too,
skilled, kind and considerate people, but every one of them is
silent about their past. The past is a forbidden subject. Always.
All I know for certain is that each of these people have some
compelling reason to be here, something to hide, something which
makes them willing to sign their lives over to the Consortia just
as we did. Still, as we came to trust each other, which on a
professional level I feel that I can, I like to think that they
take special care of you because of me.
In this way the days passed. You, growing into your new
upgraded body, this one free of IT, me working in the labs. Twenty,
thirty, seventy, ninety days passed marching with agonizing
slowness towards the magical one hundred twenty. As I said we never
measured in weeks or months, only the days mattered. I worked. I
contributed. I argued when I thought my conclusions and suggestions
had merit and often I won. I earned their respect. I was given my
own research project, electromuscular stimulation.
The first incubants who survived came out of the tanks like
babies, far worse than astronauts who have been weightless for a
year. From the records and videos which were left their road to
recovery was heart-breaking. Even before I came, the medical staff
had begun sending electric pulses through the sensors to contract
their muscles even in the tank but the studies were not well
controlled. That's my job. I've put all my efforts into ensuring
that when you and the others emerge that you will not be totally
helpless.
From that first little blip on the monitor you improved. Oh,
how you improved. I watched as day by day your blood pressure
strengthened, your pulse quickened, your respirations became
deeper, more 'natural'. Almost as I watched the cavities between
your bones began to fill in, the hollows of your cheeks softened,
the point of your hip bones became less pronounced. Before too many
weeks had passed I could no longer distinguish the individual bones
of your lower legs and arms. Most wonderful of all your hair, your
beautiful hair grew slowly back, thick and dark. Oddly, your beard
didn't grow but that, I found later was because of the female
hormones. They were critical in the regulation of metabolism. So I
guess you'll perhaps be a little busty when you emerge but that
will disappear quickly I'm told and at least you won't need to
worry about shaving for a few weeks.
All in all you became again for me the Mulder I had not seen
for months and months. I spend hours every week just watching you
sleep in your watery bed, long eye lashes lying peacefully over
smooth cheeks, that pouting mouth I love slightly open. Sometimes
you yawn. Yes, you have movement now. You turn in your floating
sleep. You sigh. You draw up your legs like a child and cushion
your head on your arms. And you dream.
They tried to tell me in the beginning that you wouldn't
dream, but I could see the small rapid movements under your eyelids
when your face is close enough to the tank wall. Oh, that beautiful
face. One day you slept with your face less than an inch from the
glass. You floated there for an hour before you turned and during
the entire time I sat beside you, my own face within inches of
yours just drinking up every wrinkle, every pore, every curve of
that familiar landscape. I watched your eyes, noted when even a
single muscle under your cheek flinched, watched your lips part and
frown or smooth into an expression of peace or intentness. Oh,
Mulder....what do you dream about?
You did have a few nightmares after you had regained some of
your strength. It was on day thirty-five that you had your first
really significant one. You truly frightened the staff. They were
more than a little concerned that you would damage the sensitive
sensors with your thrashing before they could pump sufficient
sedatives in through your umbilical cord. Since that episode they
have set instrument levels to detect the potential for such
nightmares so that preventative measures can be taken before the
onslaught. I have no quarrel with that. I would not have you caught
in one of those and be unable to wake.
And so you improved and I was overwhelmed with optimism. The
first incubant from my study, Kenneth, came out of the tank and the
results of the increased stimulation were extremely impressive. I
was the darling of the institute for that week. More than that, you
were doing so well I even caught the skeptical doctors excitedly
smiling over your chart when they thought I wasn't watching.
That brings us to yesterday when I learned they had decided to
give me what I dared not ever hope for.
They were going to let me touch you. And they did, as I said.
Just a few hours ago.
You have to understand how extraordinary that is here. The
technicians rarely need to physically reach into the baths but
occasionally they do, usually to replace a faulty sensor if it is
a critical one. The precautions they take against infection are
incredible, of course, but its been done hundreds of times. With
the help of the engineers I had designed some new sensors for my
neuromuscular stimulation program. They had just been approved for
use and I assumed that Louis would install them. Instead, with a
twinkle in his eye Louis asked me if I wanted to do the honors.
Wanted to? Better than Christmas, better than a weekend with
nothing that absolutely has to be done, better than chocolate.
As I washed and washed and washed and gowned and put on the
long, long latex glove I was shaking so I could barely put my hand
into the cuff when Louis offered it to me. The task was a simple
one, a matter of a moment, but I let my hand linger, just for a
second against your solid, smooth skin and I felt your heart
beating against my fingers. Not to be overly dramatic, but this, I
thought, was bliss. And did I imagine it or did your hand move for
a moment towards that spot which I touched? Did you sense my
presence on some level?
It was wonderful. I have been useless ever since and I don't
care. I did not sleep last night and I won't get much tonight. If
I do sleep and I dream then I want to dream about that solid,
vibrant, living flesh under my finger tips and about the days
counting down from thirty-five to one.
End of Chapter 5
All HALLOW'S EVE II - EXTREME UNCTION (6/8)
By Sue Esty (Windsinger@aol.com)
For Disclaimer see chapter 1.
Chapter 6
The Compound
Day 99
"Come on, Dr. Scully, just a little spin down to the
commissary. A cup of coffee? A danish?"
The young man's golden eyes were earnest and full of fun. Dana
had stopped in to see Kenneth, her success story in terms of her
more aggressive muscular stimulation agenda. He was leaning on the
arms of the treadmill and doing his best to leer at her. He was a
good kid, mid-twenties and exceedingly handsome, the son of someone
in the Consortia which made him unusual in that he was neither
military nor from the scientific community. There lay the problem,
Dana had heard. Kenneth did not have any of the skills that the
Shadow People normally looked for in their salvage projects so
where would they send him now that his reclamation was complete?
Despite his flirtation and high spirits Dana could see the worried
shadows beneath. What would become of him? If he were military, he
would have easily faded into some clandestine role in the system.
Medical staff took up residence right here in the Compound and
there were other research installations for experts in the physical
sciences. Kenneth, however, was an artist and a sometimes
investment broker. She supposed he might be given a job overseeing
the Consortia's financial holdings but where no one knew.
His eyes were still searching her face for a reaction to his
offer. He was scared to death. Certainly he was apprehensive about
his unasked for career within the Consortia but at his age the
greater concern was probably his uncertain future with women.
No one disputed that he was handsome, his new almost
Mediterranean coloring only accentuated his physical desirability,
but he had toxic part-alien blood in his veins now. What kind of
woman would ever be willing to touch him, much less consider doing
anything else with him? It was no wonder that Dr. Scully intrigued
him so. She was young, intelligent, beautiful, and clearly
fearless. From the beginning she had taken care of him and she had
never hesitated for a moment to attend to any of his body's needs.
With the exception of one, of course.
Having resigned himself weeks before to the fact that he
didn't have a chance with her, Kenneth settled for flirting and
wishful thinking. After all Dr. Scully was married and not only
married but very married. Her husband, whom she clearly loved more
than life itself, was one of the incubants, everyone knew that.
Theirs was the kind of great love story that had done more to
enliven the lives of the inhabitants of the isolated Compound than
any other single event in its history. Dr. Scully, however, was no
Romance heroine sighing in her high tower awaiting the awakening of
her own true love from his enchanted sleep. She worked hard and in
a very short time had thrown a considerable number of waves into
the Compound's corporate culture. No, unless something happened to
Dr. Scully's 'Mulder', and something always could despite her
eternal vigilance, a cup of coffee and a danish were all Kenneth
could expect from her.
There was not even that compensation for Kenneth this morning.
Despite his good looks and the fear that he tried valiantly to
hide, Dana politely turned aside his offer for breakfast though she
did ask to examine the healing places on his neck and stomach where
the artificial gills and umbilical line had been removed. She
wouldn't have had to but it gave her an excuse to touch him in a
way that would not send mixed signals and yet the touching was
something she knew that Kenneth and all the former incubants needed
just as surely as food and air.
After a few minutes Kenneth watched her wave and her smile as
she left him. At least he had been able to extract from her a
promise to join him and some of the others that night for his last
dinner in the Compound. They would probably never see each other
again after that. With resignation, the young man made a wish for
her happiness. Unfortunately, happiness for her was clearly not
going to be with him.
Dana moved even more quickly than usual towards Isolation
Building 1. Being with Kenneth had made her long for her few
minutes with Mulder before she got down to work for the day.
Kenneth... The young man was no fool and Dana could see the
possibilities that ran through his head. Everyone here had learned
to take a practical view to courtship like the young in the
frontier towns of old. When the selection of mates was few you
jumped at what you could find and Kenneth couldn't help but realize
that he could do much worse than spend his changed life with this
one if something should happen to Tank 42.
But nothing was going to happen to Mulder, Dana assured
herself as she emerged into the warm sunshine. A salvage rate of
less than ten percent was a fact of life and death in this place
but they had already beaten the odds. Now in his fourth month, or
Last Quarter as the staff called it, his chances had improved to
sixty percent.
Dana entered the huge warehouse-sized room after washing and
gowning as always in the anteroom. From where they were bent over
the innards of Tank 3 Louis and Grace waved. A week before a
middle-aged scientist, rumored to have been a munitions expert, had
died there unable to survive the stress of D-Day.
"You're late," Grace chided with a wink.
A little guiltily Dana nodded. Her usual routine was to come
in first thing in the morning which was something the night crew
looked forward to because then they could leave early and head for
their beds. Grace always had the maintenance kit set out for Tank
42's twice daily visitor: the glass clearer for the tank walls, the
lubricant for the tiny gears, the voltmeter to check the
electronics, the portable computer with its inputs to run
diagnostics on the system components. Today, however, Dana was late
because of the time she had spent with Kenneth.
"So why are you two still here?" Dana asked.
"We've got a new customer coming in this afternoon," Louis
replied white teeth gleaming. Louis seemed always to be working and
ever willing to go the extra mile or ten when he was needed. Though
eternally cheerful he had clearly lost someone very dear at some
time in the past.
"What have you clocked today... hour twelve?" Dana asked. "I
hope you're getting time and a half."
Grace grinned in response rising with a hex wrench in her
small, capable hand. "Of course we do, though time and a half of
nothing is still nothing."
Grace was right there Dana had to agree as she moved on. Wages
were meaningless since the Compound's inhabitants could pick up or
order everything within reason from the commissary.
Without having to think Dana moved to the chart wall and took
down the clipboard for Tank 42 from the long line of identical
charts hanging from the hooks in the hall. Correction... almost
identical charts. Tank 42's chart was far thicker. Dana, after all,
ran the diagnostics every day, not just on the twice weekly
schedule as the others were serviced.
None of the staff minded the extra care Tank 42 received. None
of the other incubants had ever had anyone there for them,
certainly not anyone from their earlier life who cared for them the
way Dr. Scully did for Tank 42. In many ways the subjects were
selected so that they would have no ties. No one to return to or
not to return to. Dana had overheard some of the other staff
talking that this arrangement with she and Mulder was itself a sort
of experiment to see if his recovery rate, both inside and outside
the tank, would be at any way accelerated by having a significant
other hovering nearby. All Dana knew was that if wishes and prayers
and the power of love meant anything, then how could it not?
Dana scanned the chart as she walked the familiar aisles
frowning slightly at the composite readings for the last forty-
eight hours. There was more fluctuation than she had seen for
almost two months but maybe that was due to the rapid return of his
strength. Dana let a whimsical smile touch her lips. Perhaps he was
becoming just as restless to join her as she was to have him out of
there and at her side.
With that pleasant thought, Dana looked eagerly up from the
thick chart as she approached Tank 42. What she saw made her step
falter. Through the murky green of the nutrient bath she could see
that Mulder's familiar shape was not stretched out and relaxed in
sleep as usual but curled tightly on one side, hands balled into
fists.
Dana's eyes flew to the tank's sensor panel then to the EEG
charts. No indication of nightmares but the background level was
clearly higher than normal. More importantly one of the indicator
lights was burning yellow in warning when it shouldn't be.
Dana's stomach tightened. The sensors were sensitive as they
needed to be and, far more often than not, the thresholds just
needed recalibration. This one, however, she had never seen out of
alignment before. Mulder's base body temperature was elevated
beyond the normal range but not excessively so. Nothing to be
apprehensive about yet or so she thought. As she watched the yellow
indicator light turned red. Dana jumped at the sudden insistent
buzz from the alarm. Fever? Why now?
"Louis?" she called her voice so tight and faint that she
wondered if the big technician could even hear it.
It didn't matter. Louis had heard the alarm at the same time
she had but before he could make it even half way from Tank 3 to
Tank 42 four more lights went to yellow, two rapidly to red and
three more alarms began their screaming clamor.
Dana rushed forward but found herself standing before the
sensor panel with empty hands feeling helpless. Give her a tray of
surgical instruments and her hands would have moved effortlessly
into action without a conscious thought on her part, but here, with
little more connecting her to Mulder than a bank of specialized
computers, she was lost. She had learned everything about normal
maintenance but little about how to deal with this type of
emergency, about how to mix the drugs and get them to the
artificial placenta for delivery across the umbilical line. Always
before when there had been an incubant with a M.A. or Multiple
Alarm crisis she had stayed out of the way to hover by Mulder's
side where she had prayed and sent him waves of love and
reassurance.
"What's wrong?" she demanded of Louis but the big man was
clearly working too furiously to respond even if he had heard her
question. Within seconds Grace had come slipping seamlessly into
his flow and began calling out readings in an order Dana had
learned by heart. Base body temperature, tank fluid temperature,
respirations per minute, respiratory volume, blood pressure, pulse
rate, venous blood pH, arterial blood pH, tank fluid pH, tank
salinity, blood gases, urinalysis, electrolytes, blood sugar,
neural output....
As the seemingly endless stream of numbers completed, Grace
started over again with updates, a quaver in her voice. A kind of
dense fog had closed in around Dana, sight dimmed and sound became
distant as if reaching her through a dense cotton shroud. Someone
must have turned off the alarms so they could hear themselves
think. Over the sudden babble of multiple voices all speaking at
once, Dana heard a groan, her own which was barely louder than the
muffled sound of many running feet. New alarms added their shrill
warnings.
"No... no... no...," kept running through her head and
probably spilling over her numb lips. Her hands and body felt cold
just as another's was suddenly burning with fever. "I should be
helping, doing something, not just standing here." By now however,
there were twelve people standing around Tank 42 and another three
dozen in the area. Everyone she had ever seen at the Compound in
any kind of medical position was there and even some she didn't
recognize. She couldn't even see Mulder any more, they had edged
her so completely out of the circle.
Grace appeared beside her with a chair and forced Dana down
into it. At least she knew better than to try to make Dana leave.
"W-What..." Dana asked her mouth seemingly unwilling to move.
"It's acute septicemia..." Grace began in her gentlest voice.
Dana's eyes opened wide in rapidly expanding horror. "God, no!
I touched him... four days ago." The tone of that despairing voice
told Grace more of what this poor woman was thinking than the
words.
"Dana, please, don't you dare think that. You didn't, you
couldn't... not any more than any of the dozen other procedures
performed every day. Infections like these are not common but not
unknown and the success rate for dealing with them in the Fourth
Quarter is very high."
Dana tried to rise out of the chair but she doubted her legs
would hold her. "Give me something to do."
"They know their job," Grace reassured softly. "You're one of
the family now. If it's within their power they'll save him for
you."
"But..." Dana protested, the shock quickly wearing off.
"Let them work. It's what they do best. Meanwhile you do what
only you can do.... love him."
********
The Compound
Day 103
1 PM
Dana sat bolt upright. She was in her own bed in the
Compound's dormitory. The room was flooded in the bright light of
midday. She shouldn't be here, she should be at Mulder's side where
she had been for three days. If she had fallen asleep, the cot they
had set up for her beside him was closer. A desperate hope flared
in her. Maybe it had all been a nightmare? Unfortunately not for
she still wore the rumpled clothes of several days. She turned in
one fluid motion to the keyboard of her computer which since that
first week she had kept inches from her side. Stabbing at the keys
with greater and greater ferocity, she tried to dial in to link to
her window into Mulder's diagnostics program. From here at any time
of the day or night she had access to all of his sensor reading and
even to the output from the security cameras so she could watch him
sleep in his alien bed. There had been comfort in being able just
to see him. Now when she needed it, however, her password failed.
Instead the message 'Access denied' flashed before her eyes, bold
black letters on a blood red background.
No, not a dream and Mulder's condition which had shown some
signs of improving...
In the three days she had stayed by this side after the
infection was discovered his condition had dropped, then rose to
drop again in dizzying swells. The latest reports she could
remember had been that he was stabilizing. What had happened since?
The receiver of the cordless phone Dana kept within arms'
reach of her bed felt cold and heavy in her hand. Grace answered
only half way into the first ring as if she had been waiting. All
she said before Dana was even able to get out a word was "Take a
shower. Dr. Esaki's waiting for you."
The words had been simple but their tone chilled Dana to the
bone. What she wanted to do was fly down the stairs and across the
courtyard still dressed in the clothes she had slept in and moved
in for three days. Correction, four days. It was well past noon.
She had slept for over fourteen hours! How they had got her here
was not a mystery when she thought of Louis' huge muscular arms.
The last she remembered, someone had pushed a cold supper tray in
front of her where she poured for the hundredth time over the
detailed case reports of episodes suffered by other incubants in
past years. She had found something not quite right when she
compared them to Mulder's chart. Her stressed and sleep starved
brain, however, had not been able to pinpoint the difference.
Dana showered. She even forced herself to wash her hair and
dressed carefully but in haste. Whatever horror awaited her would
not change greatly with a delay of a couple of extra minutes. She
didn't go immediately to Dr. Esaki's office in the annex, however,
but found herself half-running to Isolation Building 1.
Anticipating her, Louis and Grace stood in the doorway barring her
entrance. They looked terrible. Both were grey with fatigue, their
faces grim, their positions intractable. Dr. Esaki first.
The woman who moved at Dr. Esaki's side down the rows of tanks
forty-five minutes later walked erect, back straight, on numb feet.
Her chin was held high and her eyes were dark. She knew what she
would see, the project physician had told her in stark, unforgiving
detail. All of the tanks had been moved away from Mulder's.
Mulder's was now set off by itself isolated by immense sheets of
heavy translucent plastic. She could see through the curtain that
there were two tanks within as well as the Spider, the lift which
was used to lift the incubants in and out of the tanks.
She had washed and gowned in the antechamber with even greater
care than before. Silently, Louis met her at what served as a
second airlock with an isolation suit. After she had dressed Louis
took her arm. "Come this way," he said and led her to a chair
beside the new tank but on the opposite side from where she
normally sat when she visited Mulder. She would be seeing his right
side. She knew why. Dr. Esaki had been graphic and complete in his
presentation.
Dana's eyes instantly compared the fluids of the two tanks as
they stood end to end. The fluid in the new tank was clean and
clear, the fluid in the old, murky and sick-looking. Only then did
her eyes focus upon Mulder as he floated low in the new tank. She
didn't feel Louis hand on the back of her chair as he helped push
herself up to the glass. She didn't sense him leave either. There
was only Mulder and to her relief he looked almost - normal. In
profile his face was composed, not in pain, but far, far way. His
lips were slightly parted, his chest rose slowly and irregularly as
he 'breathed'. She saw patches of molted, raw-looking skin on the
sections of his chest and on the arm and leg she could see. The
left side was worse, they said, much worse and so they had set her
on this side. She raised a gloved hand to her lips and then reached
out to touch the glass.
**********
Dana Scully's Journal
The Compound
Day 103
7 PM
I don't know how I can type this. My fingers barely close over
the keyboard I am so tired. I feel as though I have not slept for
days though in reality I woke up here in my own bed only a few
hours ago.
I hadn't slept before that, however - and barely ate - not for
the three days since the infection though in my heart of hearts I
never believed that something like the kind of infections other
incubants had gotten and recovered from could keep Fox Mulder down
for long. That was until today when my world collapsed.
That's a cliche, that phrase, but unless you have had it
happen to you then you have no idea how apt it is, how it explains
the loss of the ground beneath your feet. What it feels like to
have no strength in your limbs, no air in your lungs, no light in
your eyes, or sweet voice in your ears - only agony, utter
loneliness, roaring and darkness.
What I heard in that office and have seen since is imprinting
itself onto my bones. I can't sleep which is one reason why I am
writing this. The other reason is because I have so much to tell
you and we have so little time. Of course I would prefer to be
beside you but they refused to let me stay more than a few minutes.
Not that you would have understand my spoken words any more than
these typed ones. You are so, so very far away this time, so very
far down, that I can't begin to pretend that you can hear me. I
want you to know what happened, however, so I must write. If this
doesn't make a lick of sense, it doesn't matter. If I am to lose
you I can be allowed some hours and days and weeks of madness.
They've started up our little conclave's crematoria tonight.
I saw them, though they didn't think I did. They destroy the dead
quickly here. It's safer. They are certain that you are going to
die tonight. I've given them the instructions, you see, your living
will which you made six months ago, and they don't see how you can
live even a few minutes without what serves as a respirator in
their system.
I'd like to say that they don't know you the way I do. That
you're too stubborn to die. I'd like to click my fingers in their
faces and laugh, that a little thing like GVHD can't keep a spirit
like Fox Mulder's down, but, fragile creatures can only be expected
to endure so much and your life has gone past enduring. If you die
tonight I won't blame you, but don't blame me if I will want to die
as well. I will scream and scream and I won't care if that's not
the 'Scully' thing to do. There will be no one left in my life to
be strong for.
Before we sold out bodies and souls to the devil, back in
those last weeks in your apartment, if I had awakened to find you
peacefully cold and eternally silent beside me, I would have been
devastated. I would have cried for the loss of you, for your smile
and your friendship and your joy of life, but I had known then that
death was coming, at any hour of any day.
But now? No, no, not now. Not after you, and I, have suffered
so much, not when we were so close.
Ironic, it is the past that will kill you with a little help
from me. Of all the medical questions they asked they never
inquired about previous exposure to alien proteins. I mean who
would? Still they should have known unless internally they are so
paranoid that they don't even talk to each other.
The important point missed, however, was that you'd been
exposed twice, in Alaska the first time I saw you die and before
when Dr. Sacare was shot. I still remember the horrible
inflammation around the soft tissues of your face the night they
dumped you out of that van within seconds before Deep Throat died.
Forgive me for lapsing into science here, Mulder, but if I
don't maintain my objectivity I will go mad. What has happened to
you in the past two days has little smell of an X-file about it.
Just biology.
They call in GVHD - Graft Versus Host Disease. It's a
horrible, and, unfortunately, not that rare complication of
transplantation. The cluster of immunologically active cells from
the graft, or transplanted tissue, attack the host, the patient as
being foreign. Immnosuppressed as the host is at the time the host
very often loses. You are losing, Mulder. In this battle you are
out-gunned and no amount of back up can turn the tide. All the
organs are attacked but the skin most cruelly, shredding the victim
literally of their dignity. Huge sections are dying, Mulder, and
sloughing off like a snake shedding it's skin. The left side of
your face and your left hand were affected first. There are now
dead patches on your chest and back, legs and arms. The raw
greenish dermis which is left is similar to that caused by third
degree burns but not from any victim of burns from this planet.
Like burns the raw tissue is incredibly susceptible to infection
and leaks immense amounts of vital fluids, proteins and
electrolytes which makes hemostasis almost impossible to maintain.
To make it worse because of the dead skin they have to move
you from your tank to a new one with fresh solution every few
hours. That's stressful enough without the increased risks of
infection. That's why they made me leave; at least that's the
reason they gave me.
Mulder, they are trying. I have seen Louis and Grace and the
doctors. They are moving on guts and will. They have sat together
for hours well into the night trying to come up with a solution but
have met with only minimal success. They have spent a small fortune
on tissue culture media to renew your baths, but it is not enough.
In the back of my mind I can hear your voice, something you
said to me once as you stood over your aquarium after we came back
from a case that took longer than expected. I said I was sorry
about your pets. "Everything dies eventually, Scully," you told me.
"That's what we tell little children when their fish are found
belly up in their aquariums. That's what I was told when I was
seven. Maybe that's why I keep them. As a reminder."
I have to stop here a moment. My eyes hurt. I ache. What am I
writing this for anyway? To burn on your pyre? I don't want that.
I want you. To hear your voice. To feel the touch of your hand. You
alive with me so that we can somehow carry on all our plans. This
is what we went through this hell for. Not to lose now.
Mulder, what would you say to me now, if you could?
"I get to say something finally? I apologize. My stomach is
still reacting to your, as ever, accurate and colorful anatomical
descriptions. Too often I found my fish with sections of their skin
flaking off. They were usually dead. I guess you're trying to say
that I look a little like that right now only not belly up, not
yet."
You always did have a sick sense of humor, Mulder. Now would
you listen to me for once? I'm not telling you all this to frighten
you or to gross you out. I'm telling you so that you know that you
have my permission, finally and forever, to go.
"Oh... If I do, what will happen to you, Scully? What will you
do?"
Me? I don't know. I really don't care much. See my mother? I'd
like to go home. I may have burned all my bridges, however. There's
always a chance, I suppose, that I could convince them to wipe my
mind as they did yours at Ellens. I would like to keep the memories
of you here, to remember my guilt, but that's probably not
possible.
"Hey, I thought I had the monopoly on guilt in this
relationship?"
Not in this. If it helps me to keep your memory alive let me
feel as guilty as I want, though their technique is probably not
that selective. I'll probably be left with a memory that you died
peacefully in my arms in our own bed in your apartment the night
after we rejected this insane idea.
"That's supposed to make me feel better?"
The idea of holding you in my arms, skin to skin, seems like
heaven on earth to me now. They won't let me touch you here ever
again. No living anyway. You will die alone. Oh, after they fish
you out of the tank for the final time and shrink wrap you like
poor Clyde Bruckman then they'll let me hold your lifeless body for
a few minutes as I'm dressed head to foot in an isolation suit.
"A few minutes in a Shake-n'-Bake and then off to the ovens?
That's really touching, Scully."
Mulder, will you get out of my head! No, no, I didn't say
that. Don't, don't ever leave me. You want to haunt me, go ahead.
I'll the be crazy woman who hears voices.
"You'll have to go some to match my record."
Mulder, my love, do you have any idea how much I'll miss you.
How much I already miss you. Wait for me in the white room. I'll be
along. Be there to take my hand and lead me across. I'm only sorry
you have to go alone.
"I'll carry a candle for you, Scully, for all eternity if I
have to. And if that's not enough I'll requisition one of those big
floods we always carried in dark and spooky places. I wouldn't want
you to get lost."
I'll hold you to that, Mulder. Just you remember that this is
the last time I will ever let you ditch me.
I don't ever want to try to analyze what just transpired.
Certainly no shrink had better ever read these last pages. I don't
understand and I refuse to try. I only know that, strangely, I feel
some peace. I feel closer to you at this moment than I have for
months.
It's time to close this. By my watch they are going to take
off the respirator in fifteen minutes. I want to be there though
there won't be much to see.
Just one candle growing dimmer and dimmer in the darkness.
Dana Scully's Journal
The Compound Summer 1997
Day 103
10 PM
HE LIVES.
End of Chapter 6
All HALLOW'S EVE II - EXTREME UNCTION (7/8)
By Sue Esty (Windsinger@aol.com)
For Disclaimer see chapter 1.
Chapter 7
Fox Mulder's Journal
The Compound
Summer 1998
Now what do I do?
Dana sat me down, put this pad of paper in front of me and a
pen in my hand and told me to write. And when Dana gets that tone
in her voice I'm the last one to go against her.
The problem is - write what?
Oh, I know what she wants me to write. She felt the baby
'quicken' today - that is, she felt it move - not just a little
butterfly flutter but a real kick and she wants the baby to know
who his father is. 'His mind and his soul' she says. What she means
is, she wants him to know that he doesn't really have the Phantom
of the Opera for a father. Not that that won't be a rather 'cool'
father to have when you're ten, but she wants him to know that I'm
more than the glove I wear on this obscene left hand of mine and
more than the mask that I wear on the left side of my face.
It's rather dramatic and certainly better than the alternative
of not surviving the GVHD. Dana says she loves me. Dana says I am
still handsome. Dana is looking at me through the eyes of love.
Oh, the right side isn't bad. If you only saw me in profile
and fully clothed you may not notice but how long do you really see
a person only in profile. Not for long. People are not photographs.
They put me in a padded room for a month with no sharp objects
and that wasn't entirely because I was 'born' a little underdone
and, therefore, as weak as a kitten and prone to falling. I was
appalled at what I had become inside - which was something
dangerous and not human - and even more depressed at what I looked
like outside - also something dangerous and not human. That's hard
for me to admit out loud but after six straight months of therapy
I'd better or they'll send me back for another six.
Since you're not likely even to see me in a bathing suit,
child of mine, I'll tell you that my skin is like that of some
pinto mustang, only a mixture of alien green and a pale shade of
Caucasian. The colors are especially striking on my chest and back
but not - or so Dana tells me - on my ass. Always was my best
feature. The scar tissue on my left hand is pretty gruesome and
despite rehab doesn't work well on a keyboard which is why I don't
type much now and why I'm using a pen for this. Thank goodness for
the mouse and voice activation. And the left side of my face isn't
so bad; it just doesn't look like me but like someone about ninety-
five.
You may ask me some day what it feels like to wake up after so
long living 'underwater'. In case you never ask me I'll tell you
anyway: Amazingly like waking up after a long, long lazy sleep full
of dreams. Hard to wake up. Would have been harder but the
circumstances of our 'birth' are rather drastic. Not, when you
think about it, much different from your will be.
We incubants are 'born' in a small pool. They got the idea
from the 'real' back-to-nature childbirth activists who believe in
giving birth underwater. The only difference is here they lift our
bodies into a warm birth pool - and in my case into Dana's arms -
while holding our heads above water so we wake very suddenly with
the horrible feeling that we are drowning. Only in reverse. Very
much like the worst case of the heaves you could ever imagine.
(I'm glad you're a boy. I know you're just going to love all
these yucky details.)
Months later I came across the video. I looked very much like
a fish out of water. Flopping about and convulsing. Coughing that
green gunk out of my lungs and all over every place - especially
onto your mother.
Poor Dana. With the help of Louis she held onto me, slimy as
I was. I remember her voice, calling from far, far away. And
frightened and disoriented as I was I wanted to go towards that
voice. I found out later that when she saw I was coming around she
called for a big sheet which they wrapped around me so I couldn't
see my skin as I regained consciousness. They didn't need to go to
all that trouble, I saw only her eyes. I felt her arms around me
and the gentle rocking of the warm water of the pool and her hand
running through my hair. At that moment I realized what we had
done, that we had won.
Yes, we had won. But at a price. Too high a price? I don't
think I dare try to answer that.
I know I did contemplate killing myself those first weeks
after I got enough strength to do it but it's hard to smother your
own face in a pillow. I might have tried again and in ernest this
time but it would have hurt her more than she was suffering
already.
Dana... Dana is incredible. Her strength will always amaze me.
What she went through all those months alone, in a strange place,
among those who could have been enemies. But she made a life for
herself and a life for me. Not the sort of place I ever would have
thought of as home but home because this is where Dana is and I owe
her everything.
And yet I feel that no matter how hard I try I cannot love her
enough. I cannot erase that sadness in her eyes that, although it
goes away from time to time, always returns. She blames herself,
you know, for what happened to me. She knows it is possible that
her treatment that day contaminated my little ecosystem that
triggered the GVHD.
So was it always my fate that I should live like this? I don't
know. I can't live what is left of my life with thoughts like that.
In an ironic way I know that it is perhaps for the best. If I still
looked normal, I would find life confined to the Compound
unbearable. I used to walk the streets, looking normal, looking
better than normal I'm told, but inside I always felt separate,
alone except, of course, in the later years when I was with Dana.
Now if I walked those streets... no, I don't even want to think
about it.
And so I stay here and I work and try to take the sorrow out
of Dana's eyes by keeping it out of my own.
What does your Daddy do? you will ask. As far as that goes,
what kind of patients does your Mommy have? We'll have to work on
answers to those.
Your Daddy - what an odd sound that has - is an analyst and a
linguist. Only I analyze alien radio transmissions and I've become
something of an expert in Reticulan. I still call it that though
that is not officially its name. Your Mom... I'll get to that.
Not that we work all the time. The Consortia has money and
they drop us from time to time, often with Grace and Louis, out in
the middle of a wilderness or beside a deserted and well patrolled
beach. We always have at our disposal all the comforts of home and
for a little while we try to pretend that we are normal. Now if
they would open Disney World for us for one night, now that would
be normal!
But that will never happen.
It is imperative that I tell you in detail about one of our
trips to the wilderness. They let us off high in a forested area of
Montana. Just Dana and I. Lots of camping equipment but no mirrors.
No reflective surfaces at all if you don't count the surfaces of
pools and lake. I learned long ago not to look down.
On our second night in those deep woods we spread our double
sleeping bag beside a small waterfall. I think we both hoped the
monotonous, droning sound would be restful. We had hiked for hours
and we should have been tired but sleep no longer came easy for
either of us. I doubt we would sleep at all, even now, if the
chance of being together did not draw us to that private darkness.
Always the darkness now between the phantom and his lovely lady who
in the fullness of her heart has never flinched from the touch of
his inhuman hands on her perfect body.
We laid for hours that evening neither sleeping, both
pretending we were alone. Alone? Not likely. Though we seldom saw
them, our small army of perimeter guards is always there. The big
question has always been - is their job to keep others out or us
in?
Sometimes I feel as if I'm walking in a fog, that all is
illusion. How did I ever allow myself to live like this?
Dana stirred sometime past midnight. I remember touching her
hair as she knelt and leaned over me.
"Mulder, do you trust me?"
There was something she was trying to tell me and yet not tell
me. "You're the only one I trust."
She smiled. I could see that clearly in the moonlight. I had
said those words before, so had she.
"You're going to have a visitor now. Maybe more than one, but
I have to leave because they are only willing to talk to you. Do
you understand?" She said the last word with so much meaning that
my heart began pounding as if it would escape from my chest.
Dana, stay with me! I go into a panic when I have to meet new
people, Dana knows that, but she was already gone fading into the
shadows under the trees and I knew it was useless to go after her.
I sat up and with hands that nearly refused to obey me pulled on
pants and shoes and a shirt before lying down again to wait.
'They' were only willing to talk to me. I'd heard that one too
many times before.
Three months earlier the shadow troops had brought in one of
'Them'. Not the first of the EBE's we had seen but this one lived.
Dana was on the team who attempted to treat it. The medical
facilities at the Compound are unique for that sort of thing. It
was so frightened that it's grey skin was almost blue. The only
thing I could be fairly certain of was that it was young. I had
become rather an expert since so many of the files had become open
to me. The X-files? A drop in a very large bucket compared to what
I now had access to. After all, who could I tell? I tried out some
phrases on it. It sat stunned for a long time just staring at me
but at least it wasn't huddled and shivering any longer. I tried
speaking some more and I swear it laughed. It whispered something
which I realized were my own words repeated back but with a subtle
but unmistakable difference in intonation.
They let us alone for maybe half an hour. I learned. I
mimicked. In the end it let Dana touch it. Other budding linguists
whom I had met over the months rushed in. Being medically
'interned' here I had been on site when it was brought in and this
proved a great advantage. It refused to speak to any of the others'
clumsy speech. It would only speak to me. It asked for me. It
called me 'Faquez'. Two days later it was gone. We heard nothing
more. I am privy to much now but not everything.
I'm still suspected of being 'untrustworthy'. Imagine that.
Back in the forest, alone since Dana had left me, I had a
sense that what was about to happen had come to pass because of
that incident. Someone had been contacted. My presence was required
here but I was to know nothing beforehand, not even from Dana. Very
well. I'm here. Let's get this show on the road.
Thirty-two minutes after Dana left the noise began. The heavy
vibration. I would have looked for it but the sound had no
direction. I waited. I won't lie to you, son. Your father is not a
brave man. Despite everything I had seen since, I was not a hair
braver that night than I was at the SETI site in Puerto Rico and I
nearly lost my cookies that time.
I do what I have to do, it doesn't mean I have to like it, it
doesn't mean that the very idea doesn't make a root canal seem like
a really good idea.
There was light. I laid on my back and held onto the trembling
ground - I'm pretty certain the ground was trembling and not just
me - and waited. I sensed movement. I sat up on the sleeping bag
but standing was out of the question. The light and the deep
subsonic noise were both so intense that I thought my head would
split. Gradually both faded to something manageable and I was able
to stand without falling down.
In the brightest circle of light of the ones before me I saw
a cluster of beings. More shapes and sizes than I've seen in one
place since Scully and I investigated those murders among the
carnival people. Some of the beings were the little ones. These I'd
learned are more like workers. Not very important. There were three
of the very tall, thin ones like the creature outlined in light the
night Samantha was taken and later in the doorway in Puerto Rico.
The etherial, insectoid ones. This was amazing because I had never
read of a case where more than one at a time had ever been seen.
These were a different caste I knew, priests or nobility. There
were some of the morphing ones as well. These stood on the edges
sulking, suspicious, the soldiers, smoothly morphing into various
human guises as if they were trying to intimidate me.
They were doing a pretty good job.
But nowhere was there a sign of anyone in charge, anyone sent
to speak to me. So though your father's knees were literally
knocking I greeted them in my best Reticulan. I heard a murmur in
reply from many in the throng. And one laugh. A human female's
laugh.
The group parted and something came forward. Large, bulky. A
chair, a floating chair with a small slender being sitting there
gowned in dazzling white with a mound of curling dark hair.
I remembered her as a child, had seen her 'children' clones
and I had also seen the adult copies made in her image so I knew
immediately who it was. There was no doubt in my mind that this
time it really was her.
"Samantha."
"Fox," and she smiled and I found myself flung back twenty-
three years. The aliens can't fake that kind of smile. I rushed to
hug her and found a body in my arms that was as light as that of a
child. I thought I would break her. She pulled back just a little
to lie against the cushions of the chair. I had tired her, maybe
hurt her.
"I'm sorry..."
"No, Fox, it's all right. It's just that I've been weightless
for twenty years. The gravity's hard to take." Her eyes were dark
and alive and staring at me. "Oh, Fox, it's so good to see you."
I found I didn't know what to say. I had worked, waited,
ached, suffered for so many years for this moment and now all I
felt was - useless, embarrassed, unworthy, ugly. I had done nothing
to bring this about but go on a camping trip with Scully. It seemed
- anticlimactic. I hadn't realized I was staring at the ground
between my feet until I felt her soft, light hand on the scared
ruin of my left cheek.
"Oh, Fox, it's all right, really it is. I know all about what
happened to you. You have nothing to hide from me. Believe me I
would rather have you here, tonight, as you are than to have a
handful of ashes and bone to greet me upon my return."
We talked briefly of many things, but I could tell she was
tiring quickly. There was no discussion of her staying with me as
I had always dreamed, of her coming home. This was probably just as
well because I didn't have much of a home to bring her home to. She
seemed comfortable where she was and there was also no doubt that
we would be meeting again.
Just before she left I asked, "How is it that they let me see
you? They don't trust me, you know."
"Oh, I know," she replied almost laughing. "My big brother has
been a big pain in certain people's necks for years which is the
primary reason why we selected you. Like human beings, 'Reticulans'
- to use your name - are not all of a piece and many are not happy
with the brand of human they first became involved with."
"I've met one," I said. "Jeremiah Smith."
"You've met more than one, you just failed to recognize them.
You've been watched, you've been protected. The conspiracies and
silence were never their idea, nor the colonizations threats, nor
the plans for species annihilation. I guess you could say they were
warring political parties. Harm has been done but it is not
irreparable. The ones I represent have grown stronger recently and
they plan to make their presence here known. They feel a great
moral obligation to right a terrible wrong and to prevent an even
greater wrong from coming to pass but most are uncomfortable
working with Humans. They only know that they want to have a voice
in their people's future on Earth. The group I have come to know
want us - you and me, Fox - to act as a bridge for them since both
of us in our own way have one foot in their world and one foot in
our own."
We did not talk much longer on that occasion. Breathing seemed
hard for her. One of the tall beings reached out to touch her and
it was all I could do not to scream and throw myself onto her to
protect her but 'his' touched seemed to calm her. With a kiss and
promises to return soon she left me.
The Consortia must have been scared. The Consortia must have
felt a need to court this new 'political' power because the 'offer'
of additional trips to the mountains with their isolated forests
became more frequent. Just the offer was my signal that another
meeting was in the offing. You don't have to know about what we
discussed. Mostly incredibly boring stuff. Economics, believe it or
not, and politics, subtle and truly alien. No bleeding liberals and
ultra conservatives here. Shades, upon shades, upon shades of grey.
Makes my head ache to think about it.
At the third meeting Dana joined us. I remember being
overwhelmed by a feeling of such pride as I introduced her to
Samantha. I felt my life had been in many ways a waste but this was
something I could look at with accomplishment, this relationship I
had with Dana, the trust and love we had created together in the
midst of our terrible hardships.
Samantha looked at Dana at one point, looked deep and deeper
still into her, penetrating all those Scully defenses to find what
lay within. No word was spoken but both pulled away saddened. I can
recognize 'girl' talk when I see it, even the silent variety, and
I knew better than to ask any questions of either of them.
There were a dozen trips in all. On one she examined me as she
had Dana with what I tried to call in jest her X-ray vision. In
truth I was shaken by the power I seemed to feel from the
experience. She shook her head in misery as she retreated. I knew
what she saw - the open wounds I still carried within and without.
The shaking of her head plainly told me that despite all their
powers this was not something they could cure by a laying on of
hands.
Dana couldn't attend the last meeting because she had an
incubant coming out. I didn't know it would be the last meeting
either until I got there. Samantha told me that her 'people', a
kind of family of what species or species (plural) I have no idea,
were concerned that the magnetic and gravitation fields of Earth
were weakening her to a critical point. I could see that and did
not beg her to stay. She would be back some day she said, or with
a twinkle in her eye, I might be taken to visit her.
While I was reeling from that little bombshell she reached
beside her and handed me a gift. It was small wrapped package about
the size of a football. Cold radiated from it.
"Those are yours," she said with a tired nod, encouraging me,
willing for me to believe her. "Trust me they have not been changed
in any way. When were they taken from you? Oh, years ago. Ellens?
More happened there than you can imagine. Certainly more than you
can remember." The chair began to float away in its odd manner.
"Wait!" I called, loath to see her go. "Are you leaving just
like that?"
"Fox, I have more family than you now. Do you think I've been
idle for twenty-five years? They are worried about my health. Now
be an understanding big brother and a sensible human being and
don't make a scene." She smiled and it was her impish smile from so
long ago. "I honestly don't think you'll miss me much. Those should
keep you busy until we see each other again."
Son, your life was in that box. Sam had given me the greatest
gift. Life for you. Do you think having a child is nothing? Having
a child is everything. For two people to plan to make life
together, to make the commitment to raise and nurture it, is the
essence of love and to have the possibility given to you when you
thought there was no chance...
Despite the dangers, despite the worries of our bringing the
hostage for our own obedience into the world, there was no question
of my not accepting the gift. This I had to do for Dana.
Not that we weren't both terrified in spite of Sam's
assurances. I took the box back and had people I had come to trust
open it - well, people I had come to trust as much as I trust
anyone here but Scully. What we found was lots of dry ice and a
small vial. Extensive testing positively identified the little
critters as my seed. Mine. It could be none other's and that was
incredible because I was sterile, had been since the chemo which
had been started so quickly and so aggressively that no one had
thought at the time to keep a sample.
Within a week of the identification Dana ovulated. There was
no need for discussion.
Five months have passed since that day, my son, and from every
prenatal test known to man, and some unknown to man, you are normal
and human. Totally human and ours.
That is the end of the story as of now. I go today to meet
your aunt who has returned out of the blue - or I suppose if we are
talking about space - out of the black. She retreated out of the
Earth's influence for a while and wants to see me one last time
before she takes a longer journey but promises to come back to see
you now and again.
She will never come home with me. I know that now and there is
no question of my going with her any time in the near future even
if she asked. Dana and you are my world. Besides, there is someone
I need to see. A new 'inmate' has joined our little medical
community. Among other things he is an expert in microsurgery and
plastic surgery. Due to the toxicity in my blood conventional skin
grafts were out of the question before. He is not hopeful but he is
willing to look into it. I am enough of a monster in my cells and
in my blood without scaring my own child in its cradle. I'm willing
to take the chance if he is. He can't make it any worse.
Your mother has come into the room. I'm dead. She's wearing
that gown... the one I like. Why am I telling you about this?
You're minus four months old! She just nibbled the back of my neck
at the place where the two colors of my skin join. That always
drives me mad. She wants to know if we have time to make a detour
by way of the bedroom before I have to leave. I'll make time. I'm
important enough; let them wait. Samantha will understand.
She makes me feel wonderful, your mother does. She helps me
forget. She makes me feel loved. She makes me feel normal. I'd
better go. I hear her closing the drapes. She is waiting for me.
End of Chapter 7
All HALLOW'S EVE II - EXTREME UNCTION (8/8)
By Sue Esty (Windsinger@aol.com)
For Disclaimer see chapter 1.
The Compound
A few minutes later
Chapter 8
In the darkened room Dana folded back the sheets and the
maroon comforter on the bed, dark blue sheets that would not
reflect the light. "All done?" she asked as he entered closing the
door behind him.
"Hardly. I'm just getting started," Mulder leered as he
enjoyed the view of the slight, sweet, fruitful body through the
sheer draping of the gown.
"I mean the journal... You've been at it for hours."
Turned so that his right side was towards her, Mulder began to
undress. The shoes he kicked off, the trousers slid down exposing
strong, lean mottled legs. "Oh, that. Yes, for the moment it's up
to date. Are you happy?"
"I don't know, can I read it?"
"No," he teased.
Dana drifted over to help him with the buttons of his shirt.
He had learned to do it months before one handed but both enjoyed
her assistance. Standing this close she smelled of spice and
lavender. Her fingertips trailed over his chest, just the thin
undershirt between her and his skin. The joy shivered down about
half way to his toes.
"Uncle," he groaned. "All right, vixen, you can read it. I
must've said about a dozen times how much I love you."
"A dozen? Is that all? I was hoping there would be something
juicy about your clandestine love affairs."
His arms came around her, strong and possessive the way she
liked them. "There are none. Even if there could be anyone who
would ever look my way, there will never be anyone but you for me."
"More fool they. I'm just relieved not to have to battle the
competition."
Shirt and t-shirt gone he pulled her down on top of him onto
the bed. She covered his face in little kisses, the sensation from
the left side different from the right but both were still her. The
fact that he did not flinch this time when she touched the
moonscape which was the left side of his face was a testament to
how far he had come. To his everlasting gratitude and wonder she
had never hesitated to touch him anytime, anywhere even from the
very beginning.
"What would you like?" she asked the inflection in her voice
suggestive.
"Hmmm," Mulder was all too aware of the swell in her stomach
as it fitted comfortably into his groin. It had not been this
noticeable four days before. "Ellens," he whispered.
"Again?"
"Since Samantha broke the news about what 'else' happened
there, the vision of some lovely, sensuous lady doctor teasing the
glory juice from my body really turns me on."
She breathed into his ear as her hand reached for something
beside the bed. "I'd be willing to testify to that. The first time
I don't think I was able to get past bondage before you were
panting for torture." She was kneeling beside him, the white terry
cloth tie of his robe in her hands. She began to slowly tie it
around his wrist. His eyes burned with pleasure in the darkness.
The lovely lady doctor wasn't going to have to work too hard this
time around either.
After they had scaled the heavens they dozed damp, limp,
satiated, both glowing. Her body was curled around his so
completely it was hard to tell in the darkened room where one of
them ended and the other began. After a time Mulder rolled over to
let the air of the room cool his body. With amusement he found one
wrist still bound with the robe tie, the other end tangled
somewhere beneath them. He laid with his free arm flung back over
his head and stared at the ceiling. After a few minutes as if
sensing his mood, Dana propped herself up on one elbow to watch
him, one finger languidly tracing the muscle groups on his chest.
He raised an eyebrow at her.
"Anatomy CAN be fun, as my old professor used to say," Dana
explained. An amused smile was his only response. His mind was
clearly about a million miles away. "What's up, Mulder?"
"Not me," he confessed, "at least not at the moment but keep
that up and the transportation boys downstairs are going to be
charging me for overtime."
She batted him playfully. "You know what I mean. I can almost
see the hamsters running inside their wheel in your head."
He sighed long and low. "It's just that writing the journal
got me thinking."
"Dangerous," she said automatically then her expression
saddened and she instinctively snuggled a little closer to him.
"I'm sorry. It was never my intention to bring up... " Her hand
sought his and squeezed it gently.
"It's all right." He paused but Dana could see there was more.
"Remember the cold night on the rock in the middle of that lake
waiting for Big Blue to gobble us up?"
A light dimmed in Dana's eyes. Though she spoke slowly her
response came quickly as if the memory of the incident lay close to
her heart. "You said that you envied Ahab because at least his
burden was visible to the world so he could be respected for all he
had to endure. No one would dare question the cause for his
obsession either."
Mulder raised his head a little to stare at her. For a moment
her voice had reminded him of the old days and their cases
together. Another life. "Scully, you just made your American lit
professor proud." She returned a weak, uneasy smile and gripped his
hand more tightly as he laid his head back on the pillow to survey
the ceiling once again. "What I said that night comes back to haunt
me now and again. I imagine Yahweh and Zeus playing dice and
listening in on Man's folly below. Upon hearing my particular brand
of foolishness I envision Yahweh leaping up and shouting 'Thou
shalt not tempt the Lord your God!'"
"Be careful what you wish for," Dana agreed. "But, Mulder, God
doesn't punish us here on earth - the wicked don't seem to suffer
half so often or as severely as their victims. You need only to
look in the case files over at VCS to know that. Do you think that
with all that's going on that God has time to admonish the good who
err occasionally by tempting Him?"
"If not God, then the Devil must have been lingering nearby to
try to get in the game and he dredged up that little snippet of
imprudent conversation when I confronted him at the bonfire last
Halloween."
Dana shook her head with exasperation. "I just knew that would
come up again some day."
"I wouldn't want to disappoint you."
"Mulder, I thought you were over that. The devil didn't curse
you and if he had the harm's been done. It's too late. Almost two
years too late."
"Is it? When I was first diagnosed I used to wake up every
morning and before I opened my eyes I would say to myself 'This is
a dream, only a dream'. But then I would move and the nausea from
the chemo would just about rip me open. Even later towards the end,
during those nights and nights when I couldn't sleep for the pain
but I didn't have the strength to do anything other than to lie
there, I would be in tears sometimes trying to will myself to sleep
if only so I could wake up from this nightmare." He raised up his
left hand with it's scars and claw-like stiffness. "When I came out
of the tank like this, it was just as bad if not worse. I could not
believe this was me, part of me. That we were working for 'them'.
This could not be real." His voice took on ghost of the hysterical
tones she had heard those first weeks out of the tank. "I wanted to
wake up, dear God, I wanted to wake up."
For a moment lost in memory, he began to shake. Dana took him
in a fierce embrace and desperately kissed him. "Mulder, stop
thinking like that. Stop or you will go mad."
He stared into her eyes and she saw the sanity flood back
though he had not really been so very far from her, not like those
bad times. Eagerly he hugged her, running his fingers over her back
in the way that made her squirm under his hands with contentment
like a large cat. "Sorry. Believe it or not what I was getting at
was that I don't have those thoughts very often any more. In many
ways I'm content with my life."
"Fox Mulder, content? Never."
"All right, as content as I'm likely to get and, you, Dana,
are the reason for my happiness. The only reason."
"Careful, Mulder," Dana said nestling close to his side,
"you're getting maudlin and you'll tempt the gods again."
"What else could they do to us?"
At that moment the cellular by their bed chimed. Grumbling,
Dana extracted herself from atop his long limbs to lean over the
side of the bed and hunt for the phone. She listened for a moment
then dropped it back on the floor. When she turned to him again she
was smiling in a way that made his blood begin to simmer.
"Bad weather at the designated landing site. We, sir, have
another four hours." She found the loose end of the robe belt
somewhere and wrapped it around and around her wrist to draw her
near to him. Straddling his bare flanks, she purred, "I think the
lovely lady doctor needs another sample. Are her victim's batteries
recharged?"
He reached up to run his finger slowly from the tip of her
chin, down her throat, between her breasts, over the curve of her
stomach and as far down into her musky depths as he could go. He
felt her shift deliciously on his hips. "Just call me Die Hard
which, by the way would not be a bad way to go."
Incensed by his terrible pun Dana attacked only to find that
her victim could easily turn the tables - and her. From her
position on her back trapped beneath his body she looked lovingly
up into his face. "I think the lovely lady doctor is going to get
some of her own medicine," he told her.
This time when the game was over there was no more talk.
Entwined in each other's arms, they slept, drifting as one in their
dreams.
********
Mulder turned in his sleep, not wanting to wake but freezing
and in search of blankets. Where was that comforter? When he felt
the drag of the binding on his wrist and the weight which he knew
was Dana on the other end, he moaned. "Dana, you're insatiable. The
well is dry ...."
He was going to go on to describe what might be required to
prime the pump when he realized that he did not feel that wonderful
tingling lassitude in his arms and legs that followed great sex. He
was also fully dressed and the sun was in his eyes. When he reached
out to push himself up to a sitting position he put his hand into
a clump of chill, wet grass. Recoiling as if he had been burned, he
found himself blearily awake sitting on a grey wool blanket and
indeed staring into the burning orb of the newly risen morning sun.
It's lower curve had not yet even cleared the top branches of the
ring of trees which surrounded the field.
A million images stampeded through his foggy brain: a doctor's
office; examination rooms; a Grandfather's chair by his window;
bags of poison dripping into his veins; a body he refused to
acknowledge shriveling into nothingness; a bed but no longer a
lonely one; a long black limousine; a ring of stern faces; the
tank; warm, green fluid everywhere; a pair of blue, anguished eyes;
a pool and a white sheet; the horror that was his left hand; the
rare reflection of what had become of his face in the mirror-like
surface of a lake; Samantha; a new bed in a darkened room; Dana...
Dana... Scully!
She stirred beside him. She had been awakened by the tug on
the rope around her wrist as he sat up, a tug that had nearly
dislocated her elbow. Still thick-headed, she uttered a small cry
of surprise and pain as she looked for Mulder to find out what all
the commotion was about. Had the transportation people changed
their minds? Did Mulder have to leave so soon? They must have
another hour at least...
Her eyes focused finally on his face.
Oh, God....
Her eyes widened, staring.
"Oh, God... Oh, God... Oh, God..." she whispered. "Mulder,
your face..."
He didn't move, his eyes were as wide as hers. "What's wrong
with it?"
"Nothing's wrong with it, it's... beautiful... that's what's
wrong with it."
Mulder's hand reached for his left cheek but Dana's beat him
to it. She ran her fingers gently across the planes on that side of
his face, felt the stubble of his beard, the tightness of the skin
beneath which was a pure mirror image of what she saw on the right.
Pulling her eyes away she saw that he was staring at his left
hand, watching it with awe as he made it into a fist then released
it, again and again, marveling at its precise and supple movements
as if he were witnessing the most fascinating sight in the world.
His eyes fell on the rope which still bound them together. It
was a simple white rope, not Mulder's terry cloth robe tie, a robe
which both of them were rapidly realizing had never existed. Open-
mouthed they stared around them. They were sitting on the familiar
grey wool blanket in the middle of a bowl of a field filled with
tall grass. In the sun, the dew glistened off the grass and the
roofs of the teenager's cars parked a distance away. The branches
of the trees that circled the field yet held onto a few dry, brown
leaves. Down in the lowest section of the bowl was a blacked circle
where the bonfire had burned the night before. All around it bodies
in singles and pairs, three-somes and more huddled, still sleeping,
still dreaming, under blankets and sleeping bags.
Swiftly Mulder tore off the white rope, jumped to his feet and
extended a hand to pull Dana up. It felt the most natural thing in
the world for them at that moment to reach for each other. Reach
they did and touched only to fall apart again almost shyly. The
embrace had felt both as comfortable as coming home and as strange
as a first kiss.
Home... home.... Dana felt a shudder run through her that
matched the trembling she felt from Mulder who was clearly having
trouble dealing with his own shock. Where was home? Their spartan
little apartment in the Compound came first to mind. Her home with
Mulder... with Mulder and soon...
A tiny cry of despair cut the crystal cold morning air, not a
loud cry but loud enough to bring Mulder around from the barrage of
emotions pounding against his crumbling walls.
Dana was standing before him, her eyes turned inward. An
expression of such dismay and loss showed on her face that Mulder
feared she had been shot. Her hands were spread across her stomach.
Frantically he searched but couldn't find any blood. No there
wouldn't be, he hadn't heard a shot, but something was wrong with
her stomach. It shouldn't be so... flat.
Dana had gone ghostly pale. "He's gone," escaped from her lips
in a hoarse whisper.
Mulder swallowed feeling a vast emptiness open up within him.
"Dana, he was never there."
"It was a dream..."
Mulder frowned. "A nightmare."
"HE wasn't a nightmare."
"No, no, he wasn't," he took her chilled hands in his, his
eyes beginning to burn far off with a cold anger. "No, he wasn't a
nightmare but losing him certainly is."
Mulder didn't care any more about the strangeness they had
felt. Without hesitation, he put his arms around her in a fierce
embrace and let her bury her shaking body against his. Gazing
steely-eyed out over red hair, he stared across the expanse of wet
grass towards the place where the tall, emaciated demon-priest had
stood and cursed them, where Mulder had put his hand on the thing's
arm - his left hand if he remembered correctly - and where he had
felt the heat of the fire on the left side of his face.
"Damn you!" he screamed. "Damn you to HELL!" The echoes of his
anguished cry rolled on and on across the plain.
In a short time Dana pulled away from him by herself. Staring
down, hiding her face, she began adjusting her wrinkled clothes,
pushing back her hair, straightening her spine. Mulder touched the
point of her chin with his finger and raised her face to his. It
was pale, full of sorrow but without tears. "Scully, I think it's
well past time we got out of here."
Numb lips nodded agreement. With the damp blanket trailing in
the grass behind them they moved off over the rutted field. They
walked close to each other, at first not touching, then almost
without her conscious thought, Dana's hand crept into his larger
one as they headed towards the woods, on the other side of which
they had parked their car.
"We need a warm shower," he told her as he drove, "some food
if that dump has room service, and some sleep."
"And you accuse me of being the practical one," Dana replied
bravely trying to lighten her tone. It was hard, though. She looked
over at him. He sensed her searching eyes and turned briefly from
the road.
"What can I do to help?"
The edges of her white teeth came down over so gently on her
bottom lip that still trembled slightly. "Mulder, would you... I
don't want to sleep alone."
"Not a chance that either of us will be sleeping alone
tonight."
"Today," Dana corrected staring at the rising sun.
"Whatever."
The solid, real, down-on-its-heels Motel 6 loomed up in the
distance.
"Mulder, could I ask a favor?"
"Anything."
Her voice was sullen, lacking its usual warmth. "Next
Halloween, let's just rent about a half dozen kids and go trick or
treating like normal people."
His eyes were half closed, warm and understanding but he was
still Mulder. "Could we soap the windows of the FBI instead?"
"Sure, why not. It's got to be more fun than this."
End of Chapter 8 and the end (until next Halloween).
****** And please send comments... I love email.